National archives of Australia: B942, Slide 66. Image courtesy City of Sydney
We’re used to experiencing art in conventional ways – within the context of a gallery space, or running along the corridor walls of a theatre or concert hall.
Even our relationship with street art, while more publicly accessible, is typically respectful, admiring from a safe distance and temporal at best, as we move on from it.
So what happens when art chooses to envelop an entire metropolis as its canvas, challenging the viewer to engage wholly and constantly with it?
For the last 13 years, Art & About has tantalised the imaginations of Sydneysiders with its quirky yet simple brief of creating art in unusual places across the entire City of Sydney region.
Returning at the helm of the three-week festival – which runs from Friday 19 September to Sunday 12 October – is Creative Director Gill Minervini, who has curated an eclectic and immersive selection of premiere events alongside a broader program with everything from popup photo booths outside the Queen Victoria Building to circus-style acrobatics in downtown Martin Place.
‘By taking art out of galleries and where else you might normally see it, and into streets and parks and all sorts of unusual places, people see their city in a new light,’ said Minervini.
‘Over the last few years we’ve been incorporating a lot more performance art into the program, you see that in this year’s program. It’s a very ambitious program, lots of large-scale works and some really nice, intimate-scale works that are happening in people’s lounge rooms, works that are happening in Hyde Park. It’s one extreme to the other really.’
As the creative force behind some of the country’s most loved events across the past 25 years, including Chinese New Year, MONA’s Winter Feast for Dark MOFO, and the Sydney Gay & Lesbian Mardi Gras, Minervini said asking people to view their city in this way has been the secret behind the festival’s ongoing success.
‘Each year the event is really different. We do a couple of signature events, but the lion’s share of the program is completely different each year. That’s one of the best parts of the job. Every year the program is so different, we’re working with different artists and the festival has matured,’ she said.
And the results make for a more lively and energised urban environment. ‘The public spaces are much more activated. People who walk through the same streets every day or the same park, whether there’s some sort of new installation, bring new life to old spaces. There’s certainly a sense of change and difference, and it’s the beginning of Spring so it’s a nice entrance into the warmer months,’ she said.
‘We try to involve our audience in the making of the work, or the installations, or in the being of the work if you like. It’s a very hands-on experience, Art & About. We work with artists who really want to engage the audience, not just as a spectator but also as an active participant.’
As the festival has grown, so too has the greater involvement of local and international artists. ‘We don’t differentiate … we’re looking to work with emerging artists, established artists, international artists, national artists – that wide variety is really great,’ said Minervini.
The Art & About Sydney 2013 Friday Night Live Party. Image courtesy City of Sydney.
‘People can play a part in something rather than just be a spectator and I really think that’s had an influence on the role of art, and certainly people are wanting much more engagement. You see it in the big institutions, the big art galleries of the world. Public programming has been ramped up over the last 10, 20 years. An event like Art & About, that has that as its mantra, I think that’s part of our success,’ she said.
Highlights of this year’s program include a much anticipated return by James Dive and global artist collective The Glue Society, who turn public art on its head with pop-up style photo booth Us.
Austrian artist Willi Dorner populates artists across the city in nooks and doorways during Bodies in Urban Spaces, while Shaun Parker & Company clashes shopping trolleys with ballet in Trolleys.
‘One of the really interesting things about the role is our team gets to work with a variety of artists, all who have a different process and who love the opportunity of having the City of Sydney streets and public spaces as their canvas. And that’s something that is quite unique. It’s a win-win for us.’
Notably, this year’s Art & About theme of Endangered has really aimed to do that. Minervini said that a more subtle interpretation of the theme underscores much of the entire program. ‘We’re not necessarily looking at the big-ticket items that we know are endangered like the environment, wildlife – even though we know how incredibly important that is.’
Rather, Endangered as a theme explores the spectrum of nuanced images slipping from the Australian psyche without anyone noticing, including the sound of kids playing in the street and the disappearing domestic backyard.
‘In Australia, the backyard is becoming either for people with really big incomes, or people who live a long way out. The inner city backyard is one thing that we’re looking at. Privacy, memory, all sorts of things.’
To launch this year’s Art & About festival on 19 September is the Friday Night Live Quarter Acre Block Party, which transforms Martin Place into a quintessential Australian block party from 5pm to 10pm
Minervini said that hosts Liesel Badorrek and Johnny Nasser from Loose Canon Arts are most recognised for their work on previous instalments of Art & About, the Sydney Festival and Primo Italiano.
‘The Quarter Acre Block Party is all about what I was talking about in terms of disappearing backyards. We’re recreating the backyard barbecue in the middle of Martin Place. Some will read the program and make that link. Others will just have a great time and maybe be taken back to a time where they grew up as a kid and had great parties in the backyard.’
Little Sydney Lives 2013. Image courtesy of City of Sydney
Continuing the suburban motif across Redfern and Kings Cross is The Walking Neighbourhood, where children will take adults on tours of their own neighbourhoods. ‘[It] makes a link between owning their neighbourhood, playing in the streets and all the things that don’t seem to happen so much anymore, particularly in the inner city. Some people will make that connection, others will think that it is just a great project with really valuable responses,’ she said.
With audience at the very heart of Art & About, Minervini said that there will be something for everyone. ‘It’s all about the audience, it’s giving people what they want and hoping you can predict or guess what people might want and what they don’t know about.
‘There’s a leadership element in giving or allowing people to have brand new experiences, about refreshing things each year and never repeating yourself. If you do, there’s got to be a really good reason for it. Knowing your audience and knowing who you want to attract. Beginning, middle and end it’s all about the audience.’
Art & About Sydney 2014 runs from 19 September to 12 October.
For complete program details visit the Art & About website.
Art & About is a free event.
