an exhibition at CraftACT (an event in the 7th edition of Design Canberra), including Zooming Mindfully, a digital animation by Tim Brook and Ruth Hingston based on embroidery by Ruth Hingston
As Ruth explained:
The Coronavirus pandemic has introduced new ways to retain our connections with each other while we maintain physical distance. Now our social interactions are mediated by the screen. Zoom has become a popular digital platform to keep in touch, to foster our care for one another and maintain our mental health.
My regular Mindfulness meditation group’s practice has been transformed by Zoom this year. Usually we travel to a physical space together at a specific time. Now we Zoom in together from around the country from different time zones.
Sometimes it seems absurd that we sit in front of our screens in our separate homes, quietly isolating and logging on to Zoom, so that, as a group, we can close our eyes to meditate mindfully together.
One of our practices is to apply our mindfulness focus on an absorbing activity we enjoy, such as knitting, drawing or sewing. Although we are mostly silent in the presence of others, it seems we are all pleased to see each other, smiling and waving as we arrive and depart. I look forward to Zooming in again next week.
An artist’s talk at Canberra Glassworks by Peter Nilsson, including a digital video by Tim Brook
Peter Nilsson has had a studio glass career for over thirty years in Sweden and Australia. Inspired by Scandinavian folklore and a fascination of nature, Nilsson’s work examines the fluid boundaries between humans and nature and the fragile relationship they share. Nilsson will discuss the interplay between shape and picture in his latest work as well as techniques that involve expert recycling of discarded glass, laminated and kiln formed glass and enclosed engravings.
Tim’s video documents both his work and his working process.
A group exhibition in the 2019 Design Canberra festival, including Bad Keys, a code art work by Tim Brook and Caren Florance
Subvert and convert the online hurt
Bad Keys builds on Florance’s research into online misogyny and trolling. This work uses systems of communication to explore ways to subvert and convert the hurt that we often carry around with us after encountering insults and verbal attacks online.
Abstraction is the main strategy: words morph into webs of lines that simultaneously disconnect and connect. This is unloading, not downloading.
an exhibition of straight photography at the Cork Street Gallery: unmanipulated closeups assembled slowly over 25 years
The works reveal a delicacy of detail and a harshness of ground so characteristic of the Australian inland. Many of the images involve paint that is dripping, fading or peeling, but the images remain photographic, not painterly. The patterns were formed by random processes until they were captured in the photographic frame—they were not carefully constructed like the paintings of Pollock and the Abstract Expressionists, so they display quite different surface detail. Every image is a celebration of the unexpected beauty of that Australian icon, the corrugated-iron fence. After all, it is the delicacy of detail and the harshness of ground that is so characteristic of corrugated iron.
an exhibition of works by Caren Florance at the Tuggeranong Arts Centre, including Bad Keys, code art works made in collaboration with Tim Brook
Subvert and convert the online hurt
Line Work builds on Florance’s research into online misogyny and trolling. This exhibition uses new and old systems of communication to explore ways to subvert and convert the hurt that we often carry around with us after encountering insults and verbal attacks in person and online.
Abstraction is the main strategy: words morph into webs of lines that simultaneously disconnect and connect. This is unloading, not downloading.
A digital video installation by Tim Brook and Arne Hanna in Gallery 2 at M16 Artspace, Griffith ACT
Quiet, contemplative and immersive, Australian Landscapes is a digital video installation that invites your imagination. It evokes memories of quiet moments in inland Australia, when you become absorbed in the visual richness of surface details. Very slowly, the work reveals a delicacy of detail and a harshness of ground so characteristic of the Australian inland.
Screenings of a series of works by staff and graduates of the ANU School of Art, including Untitled Moments a digital animation by Tim Brook, Ruth Hingston and Alistair Riddell
An exhibition of work by members of PhotoAccess, including Propaganda, by Tim Brook
In this exhibition, members of PhotoAccess document and interpret public space through photography. The physical and social dynamics of public space play a central rôle in the formation of community and culture. With this in mind, PhotoAccess invited members to address the theme, Common Ground, through photography and photo-based art.
an exhibition at Penrith Regional Gallery that traces seventy years of artistic responses to the historic town of Hill End, including A Reflection on Haefliger Cottage by Tim Brook
In August 1947, artists Donald Friend and Russell Drysdale made a trip to explore the former gold rush towns of Sofala and Hill End, NSW. Since then, the historically-charged landscape and remnant architecture of Hill End has continued to inspire artists to re-visit, re-imagine and re-interpret this iconic site.
An exhibition at the National Archives of Australia, including Gudgenby, a digital video by Tim Brook
This is an exhibition of work by Ruth Hingston at the National Archives of Australia after a residency at the National Archives and at Gudgenby Ready-Cut Cottage in the Namadgi National Park. The digital video is a poetic documentation of the residency, the work in progress and the final work.
This exhibition celebrates 20 years of the Hill End Artists in Residence Program. It is curated by Sarah Gurich. The works are drawn entirely from Bathurst Regional Art Gallery’s permanent collection, including photography by Tim Brook and sculpture by Ruth Hingston.
A screening at PhotoAccess, including a multimedia work by Tim Brook and Arne Hanna
Fire Station is a multimedia work based on material at the Canberra Fire Museum. It’s presented as a digital video loop but not as a conventional narrative. Instead, the work uses layers of images and sounds to evoke something of the experiences of our firefighters—a few hints of their sporadic dramas; some suggestion of their daily routines and accumulated memories.
An exhibition at the ANU School of Art Gallery, Ellery Crescent, Acton ACT, curated by Ruth Hingston for the centenary of Canberra, including Fire Station, a multimedia work by Tim Brook and Arne Hanna
This exhibition highlights the variety and inventiveness of professional artists who live and work in Canberra. It includes works in a wide range of media, from embroidery to digital animation. Each work in the exhibition draws on material from a local collection of cultural material. Each celebrates an aspect of the lives and experiences of real Canberrans, people who have worked, raised families, played sport, made art and created communities, unaffected by the antics of the fly-in-fly-out politicians whose pronouncements are routinely attributed to a mythical ‘Canberra’.
A book launch and an exhibition of photographs at PhotoAccess, Griffith ACT, celebrating Canberra’s centenary, including Roll This Way a photograph by Tim Brook
1 August–28 August 2013
25th Anniversary Portfolio
An exhibition curated by David Chalker at PhotoAccess, Griffith ACT, including Rijeka Crnojevića a photograph by Tim Brook
A group exhibition at The Photography Room, 14 Foster Street, Queanbeyan NSW, including prints by Tim Brook
For several years I’ve photographed partially reflective surfaces (ponds, windows, billabongs, spectacles…). Ambiguities result—not ambiguities constructed but ambiguities revealed—ambiguities that give voice to opposites. Partial reflections reveal both connections and contradictions between opposite viewpoints. And Haefliger Cottage breathes contradictions.
Originally Haefliger Cottage was an unassuming dwelling for a miner; now it bears a heavy load of history. It’s twisted with age. Nothing’s quite square. Nothing quite joins. Time has allowed a liquid flow of glass in the panes of the windows and the bookcase. The thicknesses of glass have become uneven and the panes now distort every view (just a little) and every reflection (just a little more). Reflections on Haefliger’s Cottage is a collection of these views and reflections. All faithful, none true.
An exhibition of photomedia work by Tim Brook, curated by Ruth Hingston, in The Photography Room, upstairs at The Artists Shed, 14 Foster Street, Queanbeyan NSW.
A screening at PhotoAccess, Manuka ACT, of a digital animation by Tim Brook, Ruth Hingston and Alistair Riddell
Slow, quirky and very Canberra, Untitled Moments is a digital animation based on embroidery.
Untitled Moments is a collaborative project exploring the visual impact of embroidery and photography in a digital animation. We’ve used digital technologies to combine images and sound to create narrative fragments—imagined incidents drawn from our observations of Canberra’s most unremarkable moments.
The resulting work does not attempt to mimic cartoons or conventional animations. It’s a pastiche, an idiosyncratic mixture of embroidery, drawing, watercolour, photography, scanography, digital animation, field recordings and digitally generated sounds. The final effect is sometimes contemplative, sometimes deliberately cheesy.
An exhibition of code art at the ANU School of Art, Acton ACT, including Rebalanced, a code art work by Tim Brook
Art Machine is an exploration into the boundaries between digital art, code art and new media installation.
What exactly constitutes an artwork—the intent of the artist, the materials used in the production, the mode of presentation, the experience of the viewer? Art Machine aims to explore these notions by staging an exhibition where artistic intent, content, production materials and final presentation of an artwork operate independently of each other and yet combine to create an art experience.
Art Machine will pit locally coded digital art machines against text, images, video and sound submitted by you via Art Machine’s 24/7 online submission system—artmachine.tv.
Art Machine is accepting submissions, so browse to artmachine.tv and contribute your text, image, video and sound—your digital submissions will form the backbone of this unique exhibition and art experience.
An exhibition at PhotoAccess, Griffith ACT as part of Vivid, the national photography festival, including an installation by Ruth Hingston and Tim Brook with Lea Collins
An exhibition of photographs curated by Gavin Wilson at the Hill End Art Gallery, Hill End NSW, including A Reflection on Haefliger’s Cottage №6 by Tim Brook
An artist’s talk at Bathurst Regional Art Gallery, including screenings of Works in Progress, a slide-tape sequence by Tim Brook and Arne Hanna after works by Ruth Hingston
Works in Progress is one result of a Hill End residency—a description of the residency—a description where nothing is spelt out. A slowly evolving sequence of still images, rich and alluring, invites you to make connections and imagine your own stories. It offers hints about some of the things an artist does to arrive at a body of new work.
An exhibition of photographs, curated by Alison Bennett, at Bathurst Regional Art Gallery, including Hill End photographs by Tim Brook
Hill End is a massive work of fiction, a story-telling project spanning generations. It is more than a place—it is a dense web of images, narrative, mythology; a site of contested meaning. Frames of Reference is an exhibition of photographs of Hill End from 1872 to 2005. It features the work of Russell Drysdale, Beaufoy Merlin, and 11 contemporary photographers—Alison Bennett, Tim Brook, Dacchi Dang, Sarah-Mace Dennis, Brett Hilder, Svenja Kratz, Cathy Laudenbach, Heidrun Lohr, Catherine Rogers, Greg Weight and Glenn Woodley.
An exhibition of photographs by John Crossley, curated by Tim Brook, at the CEMA Gallery, Monash University, Clayton VIC, later touring in Victoria and South Australia
An exhibition of photographs by Tim Brook at Bathurst Regional Art Gallery
Intriguing details from a historic town—Warped Walls and Reflections on Haefliger’s Cottage are exhibitions of recent work by two visual artists from Canberra. The mixed media works and photographs were inspired by a Hill End residency and represent exciting new directions for both of these artists.
An exhibition of works in miscellaneous media at The Booking Office Gallery, Bungendore NSW, including photographs by Tim Brook and mixed media works by Ruth Hingston
A concert of visual music in the Canberra Festival, at the National Film and Sound Archive, Acton ACT, including slide-tape works by Tim Brook
This concert is a thoughtful blend of sound and image.
Low tech and alluring, each of the works screened, each little piece, shows how small change can make for greater seeing.
Sounds and images are taken from life and gently reshaped.
Each work is an invitation to make connections; to imagine; to tell stories.
Visual music is for adults whose brains are still alive.
A concert of audio-visual works at the Australian Centre for The Arts and Technology, Acton ACT, including Lines, a slide-tape piece by Tim Brook and Arne Hanna
Music theatre at Images, Dickson ACT, including a slide-tape piece by Tim Brook and Len Duke
on Friday 13 February 1987
Fat Gods, Skinny Gods
A theatrical production at TAU Community Theatre, Braddon ACT, including a slide-tape piece by Tim Brook
Fat Gods, Skinny Gods considers the influence of adult-created myths on young people in the process of finding a balance between fantasy (how life could be) and reality (how it is).
The material for Fat Gods, Skinny Gods was developed from many weeks of group discussion and workshopping. It was my task to find the appropriate images and language to express what was often an emotional feeling of the individuals or group.
In so doing, I did not attempt to dilute these emotions. What is presented intends to reflect what very often is a ploy (unintentional or not?) by society to deceive us into believing that a brighter tomorrow can be bought on a time plan.
Fat Gods, Skinny Gods is presented as a piece of symbolic, hopefully provocative, theatre—interweaving a well-known fairy story with contemporary reality. Like the majority of our productions at TAU, it is an original, group-devised work, which is developed from a long and demanding workshop process involving considerable risk.
We hope you find the performance stimulating.
Domenic Mico
24 June–29 June 1985
Forest of Gods
A theatrical production at TAU Community Theatre, Braddon ACT, including a slide-tape work by Tim Brook
A concert of electronic and multimedia arts in the Everest Theatre at the Seymour Centre, Sydney NSW, including About Time!, a slide-tape work by Tim Brook and Adrian Keenan
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