Archive for December 2013
WOTWEDID Blog: 2013 in review
The WordPress.com stats helper monkeys prepared a 2013 annual report for this blog. 
Here’s an excerpt:
The concert hall at the Sydney Opera House holds 2,700 people. This blog was viewed about 18,000 times in 2013. If it were a concert at Sydney Opera House, it would take about 7 sold-out performances for that many people to see it.
Click here to see the complete report.
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FROM SMALL THINGS … : Queensland Small Towns Documentary Project
Queensland Small Towns: Documentary Project – Invite
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Queensland Small Towns: Documentary Project
Brisbane Powerhouse, 12 November to 1 December, 2013
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Queensland’s regional areas are fast becoming the most common subject for the scrutiny of the photodocumentary image-makers. In August the Central Queensland Project exhibition was shown at the Powerhouse in Brisbane and now, only a few months later, another show entitled Queensland Small Towns: Documentary Project is hung in the same venue. This new contribution to the documentation of regional communities is a student/lecturer project initiated by the three big Institutions: University of Queensland, Queensland University of Technology and the Queensland College of Art (QCA).
With the support of academic staff, students of these photography and photojournalism faculties descended on the Queensland towns of Moranbah and Dalby. The exhibition’s coordinator Earle Bridger from QCA, chose these two regional localities because of the impact of mining. To add contemporary photodocumentary rigor to the activity, professional photographers: Russel Shakespeare, Adam Ferguson and Shehab Uddin were collaborators and advisors to the fieldwork.
The project’s mission, as stated in exhibition press, was to capture: ‘The stories, characters and everyday lives of people in Queensland outback towns’1. They further claim that: ‘this unique photo-documentary project [will] reflect[s] the changing face of rural Queensland.’ 2
This project was instigated to provide an in-field experience for the students. They were charged with the challenge of avoiding the traditional news story and to: ‘capture a visually appealing and thought-provoking narrative to a high-professional standard.’ 3
The exhibition at the Brisbane Powerhouse was extensive–the photographic images and video interviews were shoehorned into every available space. This made viewing of the show a little like a ‘hide and seek’ exercise. Its curation within this space created a fragmented view confusing the holistic flow of the exhibition.
Queensland Small Towns: Documentary Project – Installation … Photo: Doug Spowart
Queensland Small Towns: Documentary Project – Video and Photo installation … Photo: Doug Spowart
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Under the tutelage of lecturers and the photodocumentary practitioners assigned the project, as well as study, research and personal preparation, one may think that these primary concerns are well covered. However there is one other critical factor–The preconditioning from existing media overexposure and hype. This rhetoric includes the following: That these small towns, besieged by the extraordinary pressures of the extractive mining industries, are places in a state of flux between the perceived benevolent farming practices of the past and the boisterous bully of mining. These once sleepy rural places are now zones of friction between itinerant workers, inadequate infrastructure, fractured families and ‘fracked’ communities. Any documentary commentator must not let this prejudice impede their impartial reportage. Furthermore one must consider methodological and ethical issues around the selection of subject/s, the gaining of access and trust and the authenticity of the resulting work.
All that aside, what of the exhibition Queensland Small Towns: Documentary Project? What I found was a proficient and diverse presentation of contemporary photodocumentary work. Mixed in amongst the contemporary trend of the bland document aesthetic were emotive and sensitive photographs of private lives in difficult times. Images were grouped as mini photo-essays enabling a concept or a subject to be pursued.
Importantly the opportunity provided to these students and the lecturers to get into the field is one of the best lessons they both can have. As mentor Russell Shakespeare comments: ‘I think these projects are so important on every level. To get students out working on self generated stories and also for the Town to have a group of photographers recording “History” as they see it, and then to be archived by the State Library, hopefully this project will continue on throughout other Qld Towns in years to come.’ 4
Unlike the financial reality that students may encounter in their post graduation world, a $50,000 Arts Queensland Creative Partnership Grant funded the Small Towns Documentary Project5. And fittingly, considering the generous budget for the project, the photographs and video works will be gifted to the people of Queensland by their inclusion in the permanent collection of the State Library of Queensland.
This work will add to a significant archive for the future, however I’m concerned about the ‘thought-provoking narrative’ and its importance now. The exhibition at the Brisbane Powerhouse only marginally serves the purpose and power of contemporary documentary work … to communicate. No mention is given to exhibitions in Dalby and Moranbah–the communities that gave the project subject matter to image and document. The project is also left wanting in the application of eJournalism platforms like YouTube, Facebook, blogs and websites. Googling the project one encounters variations of the same succinct media release without external links to any online archive that says what was done, who did it and most importantly, provide a space for the communities documented to share and extend their stories.
The domain of the photodocumentary practitioner is not just the creation of material for the archive–its perhaps more important role is now, being in and of the times, and the communities and people who shared stories and submitted their lives to the gaze of these lens men and women. These stories are required now to inform, to cajole, to stir commentary and demand corporate and political acknowledgement, response and action. That’s where documentary photography does its best work …
Dr Doug Spowart
December 27, 2013
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1 http://brisbanepowerhouse.org/events/2013/11/12/queensland-small-towns-photo-documentary-project/
2 Ibid
3 http://www.uq.edu.au/sjc/qld-towns-project
4 Online correspondence from Russell Shakespeare
5 http://www.linkedin.com/pub/earle-bridger/b/521/737
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What follows are images and videos from the exhibition.
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Please Note: The photographs in this exhibition were presented as multiple image groups – only single images represent the photographer’s body of work. I have included the photographer’s statement under most images to give an understanding of their project and the context for the work. Most images in this review are from camera exposures within the exhibition environment and may not represent the image/s accurately due to reflections and uneven lighting.
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“Al Phillips, Drilling Supervisor + Chris Mannion, Driller, Moranbah” … Photo: Adam Ferguson and Brodie Standen, 2013
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Potential buyers survey a pen of cattle at the Dalby sale yards. The weekly auctions are Australia’s larget one-day cattle sale, with over 6,000 head of cattle passing through each week.…Photo: Kimberley McCosker
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“Joyce Coss”
83 years old with “Waddles” her Sliky Cross.
63 years living in Warra.
Photo: Russell Shakespeare 2013
Beyond the sporting ovals, on the outskirts of Moranbah, Sean lives in a trailer. The trailer is powered by a petrol generator and drinking water tanks are filled at a family member’s house. He lives there by choice, a house has “too many walls”. Separated from his wife Sean shares custody of their 5 boys. Charlie, Darcy, Bailey, Harley, & Riley spend each weekend with their Dad and I was fortunate enough to spend a few days with them while they visited over school holidays. With Moranbah as a backdrop, a town where much of the population’s main objective is obtaining and retaining material wealth, getting rich and getting out, Sean’s lifestyle begs a closer look at what separates need and want. I would like to thank Charlie, Darcy, Bailey, Harley, Riley & Sean for their hospitality & allowing me to tag along with them. Photo: Cory Wright
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“Moranbah McDonald’s which lies on the outskirts of town” … Photo: Julia Whitwell
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The Wilkie Creek Rural Fire Brigade in conjunction with other local fire brigades, coordinate necessary hazard reduction fires, as well as keeping life threatening fires at bay during the high risk summer season. Pictured [in my project] are their lives on a daily basis, as well as their involvement in a hazard reduction fire completed near Lake Broadwater in October, 2013. Photo: Eva Turek-Jewkes
Four videos by students from the University of Queensland School of Journalism and Communication:
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“Grassdale Feedlots”
A curios 2 year old, 620kg Hereford steer in Grassdale Feedlots state of the art facility (to extreme left of series). Pens are cleared every 50 days as part of the facilities self-audited quality and health assurance measures. World class traceability systems allow staff to track, monitor and isolate specific data on each individual beast, including birth date, purchase date and origin, weight, breed, feeding ration and medical record. Established in 2008, Grassdale Feedlot is a 13,000 acre property 30kms south of Dalby centre. Currently with over 38,000 head of cattle and a capacity of up to 50,000 head, the feedlot boasts one of the largest and most technologically advanced feedlot facilities in Australia. The estimated $60 million facility employs over 50 staff and is a major driver in the economic stability of the Dalby, Millmerran and Chinchilla region and remains at the forefront of grain-fed beef production in Australia employing some ground breaking technologies in milling and feeding processes. … Photo installation: Victoria Nikolova
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“Grassdale Feedlots” … Photo installation (detail): Victoria Nikolova
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Garden Bed. Cunningham Street … Photo: Liss Fenwick
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“Some Trash, Others Treasure”
Pioneer Park Museum in Dalby seems a place suspended in time, somewhere around the beginning of the 20th century. Located on Black Street – once very quiet and peaceful but nowadays one of the main truck parking spots in town – the museum is a magical space with colonial houses and antique machinery, accompanied by rustling of leaves and bird’s trill. Elaine and Daniel Fox, the main founders, have lived on-site for almost 11 years, taking care of this magical place on a daily basis. They began 23 years ago with only seven antique tractors. Today, they can boast of one of the largest collections of operating antique agricultural machinery in Queensland – some of which date back to the early 19th century. Together with a few passionate volunteers they keep the place alive and once a year, during Field Weekend, the town of Dalby travels in time to discover again the old knowledge, tradition and way of living of their ancestors. The Museum is mostly financed by an annual fund from the local government, entry tickets, and the craft shop income and the Field Day. However, it is hard enough to keep it working, with a fast developing technology and little funding; they struggle to keep their museum operating in the modern, quickly changing mining town, that Dalby has become. … Photo: Kasia Strek
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“No Access”
This work is not against mining. For whether it be the computers we use to stay connected, the solar panels we purchase that make us feel socially responsible or the cameras I use to tell stories, mining is embedded into the fabric of the 21st century. The debate should not be whether or not to mine, but rather how is mining to be controlled. What became obvious in Moranbah was that combined the mining companies controlled the political and social agendas. Through ostensibly generous salaries, subsidized housing and rare community donations mining companies have become the pushers and the population the addicts. Mine workers are afraid to speak to strangers for fear they are the media. Criticism is only whispered when in the company of friends. The right to have an opinion that may differ from the company has been severely eroded. To express that opinion puts job and home at risk. No Access argues that Australia should retain exclusive rights to its resource management. It argues for controlled mining. But most of all it presents a snapshot of the liberties we have sold in order to satisfy those who seek to maximize profits and minimize social responsibility. Moranbah. David Lloyd. 2013.
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The photographers and video producers retain all copyright in their images and presentations. Text and installation photographs © 2013 Doug Spowart
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BACK STORY: The Icons & Revered Australiana Show
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ICONS Logo
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The Icons & Revered Australiana show: Twenty – Five Years On
The ICONS on ICONS exhibition at the Cobb+Co Museum in Toowoomba features 5 local photographers. For the show I have selected 26 gelatine silver photographs drawn from my archive. They were originally prepared for the Australian Bi-centennial celebrations in 1988 – 25 years have elapsed and yet the images are as fresh and evocative as ever. For me the work represents an important aspect of my photographic and photobook work – where the narrative of life and culture is expressed through a set of images and sometimes accompanied by a complimentary text.
So here is the back story of my Icons & Revered Australiana
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Doug Spowart
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I have had a lifetime interest in the Australian idiom, slang and its stories. This body of work represents the culmination of a personal investigation into what are seminal identifiers of our culture and the way the Australian condition has shaped our language. In my early teenage years I read most of John O’Grady’s books like They’re a weird mob and Gone Fishin. His dictionary of Australian-isms Aussie English was a particular favourite. At that time I would encounter people, mainly older people, who spoke using the language defined by Sidney J Baker’s or what Afferbeck Lauder called Strine, (a condensation of Australian with an emphasis on the latter part of the word = STRINE).
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Throughout my life I have travelled around Australia, firstly as a child with my family then later with friends and from the1980s onward as a tour leader on outback safaris. I always felt close to the land and the Australian condition and was fascinated by the stories and the vernacular language by which it was described. I met outback characters including songwriter/performer Ted Egan, before his Northern Territory Governor commission, who immortalised these Australian-isms and stories in song. I was also influenced by a library of photographers like Jeff Carter, George Farwell, Douglas Baglin and perhaps even Rennie Ellis who made photographs and told stories in their photobooks. Inspiration also came from Barry Humphreys, Walkabout magazine and the works of painters like Russell Drysdale, Hans Heysen and Sydney Nolan.
From my experiences I decided to make a selection of things Australian that I considered were so embedded in culture that they could be considered as icons and revered with a religious fervour. I resolved to call the exhibition Icons & Revered Australiana. To provide an extra personal challenge to the project I limited my selection to an A to Z list representing a range of ideas, subjects, myths and localities. I then embarked upon a 4 state and territory journey to make images. While most images were deliberate and targeted some photographs were made along the way as opportunistic discoveries. I do remember specifically driving into Sydney, putting a wire coat hanger under my arm and walking down to the Sydney Opera House to photograph the bridge.
The Icons show was presented at Imagery Gallery in March 1988 and I think, well received. However the Courier Mail critic, a friend of mine of the time, was not impressed – his headline read There’s better work to come! I did ponder the thought that there may have been a sub-plot to his review. The exhibition went on to show at another venue in Queensland and individual images, such as the BIG Coat Hanger received accolades, was published in many journals, and went on to be one of my signature images. After the show was over the exhibition was de-framed and the mounted images sequestered away in archival solander boxes.
But what of this current iteration of the Icons & Revered Australiana body of work? Twenty-five years may have elapsed and yet these pre-digital gelatine silver images are as fresh as ever – a testimony to the special nature of infrared and black+white analogue photography. In revisiting the original catalogue text, I’ve re-connected with the thread of humour, irony and pastiche that has always run through my work.
While those who knew these aspects of life, culture and language intimately, and practised it daily, may have long passed on, Icons & Revered Australiana may still resonate with contemporary audiences. I do not expect that everyone will begin to use terms like ‘Bonza’, ‘Sheila’ and ‘Wouldn’t be dead for quids’, although we do encounter this kind of vernacular language in contemporary song writing, (particularly in country and western music), prose and poetry. And for a while we enjoyed it in the wonderfully expressive Strine of Steve Irwin.
These Icons and Revered Australiana are just the tip of the great myriad of things Australian. Deep down, within us, is a kind of ‘knowing’ of our Australian-isms, and how they have defined us and continue to define us as a people and a country.
Doug Spowart
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SO HERE THEY ARE: My ‘A to Z’ Icons & Revered Australiana
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A = Ayers Rock – Revered as the largest monolith in the world, Ayers Rock is now known by its traditional Aboriginal name Uluru.
B = The Black Stump. It was once believed that the black stump was the limit of possible human habitation beyond which nothing existed but useless land and desert. Today, it’s revered by a roadside stop featuring a Black Stump storyboard and black painted stump icon, a car park, BBQ and toilet. And lots of people have come to live on ‘the other side’. Near Coolah, New South Wales.
C = The Big Coat Hanger – Slang for the Sydney Harbour Bridge.
D = Dunny – The Australian out-house or toilet is affectionately known by this name.
A coach camp dunny Birdsville, Queensland.
E = Eucalyptus – This is an iconic plant embedded in the Australia psyche; from the arts to the construction of our towns, and the source of therapeutic aromatic oil – a familiar memory in everyday households of Australia. On the Heysen Trail, Mount Lofty Ranges, S.A.
F = Fosters – An historically famous Australian beer. Barry Caves, The Northern Territory.
G = Gundagai – Five miles from Gundagai is the location described in the bush verse about a bullocky’s bad luck. While the popular version of this story makes a hero of the bullocky’s dog who ‘sat on’ his tucker box protecting it from harm. However anyone reading the original poem would come to the conclusion that the ultimate in bad luck had befallen the bullocky – that the dog had actually ‘shat in’ the tucker box. In this image of the tourist memorial near Gundagai a statue of the dog ‘sits’ on the tucker box while kids steal money from the wishing fountain in front.
H = Holden – The quintessential Australian motor vehicle. Fish Lane, South Brisbane, Queensland.
I = Iron (Corrugated) – The most common and versatile building material for outback structures. Olary, S. A.
J = Joe Blake – Equals ‘snake’ in Australian rhyming slang. Mannahill, South Australia.
K = Kangaroo – An endemic Australian species often so prolific in number that road signs are erected to warn motorists of their presence. The signs are also useful as a test of shooters skill if a shortage of the real thing exists. Judging by this example the Roos have a fair chance. West of Nyngan, New South Wales.
L = Luna Park – A Temple of fun, frivolity and scary rides for Sydney-siders and Melbournites. St Kilda, Melbourne, Victoria.
M = Meat Pie – The eating of a meat pie and tomato sauce is a celebrated Australian rite or sacrament, and if you come from Victoria the Four’n Twenty variety would have once been considered the best! Broadbeach, Queensland.
N = Ned Kelly – Located at Glenrowan this colonial sacred site is the place where the Australian folk hero Ned Kelly made his notorious last stand against the Victorian Police. Erected to enable ‘pilgrims’ to ‘revere’ the place, these modern day structures house a multitude of Ned Kelly tokens and souvenirs. Rather than recognise this as a solemn and tragic clash between authority and the underclass, these souvenirs often seem to parody the event. Here, the matches are a strange connection to the fact that the Victorian Police set fire to the Kelly gang’s refuge and burned it down to enable his capture. Glenrowan, Victoria.
O = Outback. An open gate, and two tyre tracks pointing toward infinity best expresses the great expanse of wide-open space that is the outback. Near Scopes Range Bore Western, New South Wales.
P = Pub. Revered as the typical lonely outback pub the Birdsville hotel is so inundated with visitors for the annual races that the traveller’s empty beer cans are removed each morning with a front-end loader and a tip truck. Birdsville, Western Queensland.
Q = Quid. The pre-decimalization equivalent of two dollars, often associated with value statements like ‘wouldn’t be dead for quids’ and, ‘not the full quid’. Toowong Cemetery, Brisbane, Queensland.
R = Red Heads & Red Backs. Both being red these two Australian items can spell danger. Queensland Museum, Brisbane.
S = Sheep. The Australia economy was once described as living off the sheep’s back. Immortalized here is a giant merino variety attracting pilgrims to its past glory. Goulburn, New South Wales.
T = Thong. Casual Australian footwear. Western Pains Zoo, Dubbo, New South Wales.
U = Ute. Invented by Australians both in concept and name. Longreach, Queensland.
V = Vegemite. A black vegetable extract used as a spread on toast or Salada biscuits.
W = Waltzing Matilda. Shown here is a shrine erected by the McKinlay Shire Council to mark the location where Banjo Paterson wrote the Australian anthem about a swagman’s demise on stuffing a jumbuck (sheep) in his tuckerbag. Combo Waterhole near Kynuna, Queensland.
X = Xanthorrhoea. The botanical name for the Australian native plant commonly referred to as the grass tree. Near Canungra, Queensland.
Y =Yabbie. Any form of the Australian freshwater crayfish of the genus Cherax. Yabbying or catching yabbies is a favourite pastime of Australian kids. Near Nerang, Queensland.
Z = Zack. The colloquial term for a pre-decimal coin with a value of 5 cents, usually associated with statements of worthless value, hence ‘not worth a zack’ – pertaining here to barren outback country. Near Yunta, South Australia.
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This unique state complete exhibition set is available for purchase – Contact me for details
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Cobb+Co Museum – Icons on Icons events
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Images and text © Doug Spowart
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This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivs 3.0 Unported License.
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COOPER+SPOWART to talk @ Cobb+Co Museum Dec 13
The Roundabout Clocktower from Weiley’s Hotel balcony
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CLICK HERE TO BOOK ON THE COBB+CO WEBSITE
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In the Dark Room with… Cooper+Spowart
In this talk we will discuss a number of topics and including:
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A commentary on the works in the ICONS on ICONS exhibition
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Our Nocturne residency projects around Australia
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How to make amazing Nocturne Photographs
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Our use of Social Media to connect art with the community.
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Attendees may wish to conclude their night activities @ Cobb+Co with a visit to the nearby Christmas Wonderland Spectacular in Queens Park
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St James’ Catholic Church
Outside the Grafton Hotel
The Subway – The Nocturne Muswellbrook Project
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VIEW A VIDEO OF THE ICONS SHOW FEATURING THE PHOTOGRAPHERS
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TO BOOK THE EVENT
http://www.shop.qm.qld.gov.au/cobbandco/in-the-dark-room-with-doug-and-victoria.html
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Cobb+Co Museum – Icons on Icons
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wotwedid 