Queensland Art Gallery - Queensland Government

Pacific Reggae / Marcel Meltherorong aka Mars Melto
Singsing with Marcel 2009
Wit Pimkanchanapong
I, you, we 2009
Hiraki Sawa
Every Little Thing Moving 2009
Shirana Shahbazi
Still life: Coconut and other things 2009
I see my music as a tool — a way of teaching my children and future generations
about holding on to Vanuatu culture, our customs and our traditions at a
time when Western influence is changing our way of life. Many people are
concerned about our country and our children’s place in it — where do they
fit in with these two different cultures? And how do they hold on to their own
culture when Western influences, in cities like Port Vila, are so flashy and shiny?
We are questioning ourselves. I remember an old fella told me that if we can
marry Western knowledge with our traditional knowledge that would make our
children ‘twice wise’.
— Marcel Meltherorong
Marcel Meltherorong — reggae musician, and singer and songwriter for
XX Squad — invites everyone to join him and ‘singsing’, which means to sing
loud in Bislama, one of the many languages spoken across the archipelago
of Vanuatu. In this multimedia activity, children are introduced to Marcel,
his country and reggae music before stepping into the karaoke-style booth
to sing and dance to his popular reggae track ‘Children’s day’. Children’s
performances are recorded and played back on the big screen in video clip
format for everyone to watch and enjoy.
KR
Speaking Thai is not about playing a time travelling game, but more about a role
playing game. Yes, it is very similar to how you choose your ‘avatar’ character in a
video game. Thai language allows you to change your ‘self’ [in] every sentence,
depending on the situation. There are more than ten versions of ‘I’ available to
choose from, and ‘you’ will change accordingly. There is the ‘formal I’, ‘polite I’,
‘friendly I’, ‘arrogant I’, ‘small I’, ‘very small I’, ‘feminine I’, ‘masculine I’, and a lot
more. It is about social hierarchy in a culture where the language is more aware
of who we are, whom we are talking to, and what situation we are in now. I, you,
we interprets this assumption . . . to make it direct and straightforward, to let
‘(small) you’ understand ‘(big) me’ when I speak English.
— Wit Pimkanchanapong
Wit Pimkanchanapong’s I, you, we is a multimedia activity where the
participants become the subject. Images of two people’s faces are first
captured on camera in the activity space. With a little technical magic, their
facial features are fragmented and recombined to form a new portrait, with
surprising results. Posters of the collaborative portrait I, you, we can then be
emailed home or to a friend as a memento of a visit to Kids’ APT.
KR
In his film elsewhere 2003, Hiraki Sawa has created a film set within his London
apartment and filled it with intricate, homemade animations. Everyday objects
come to life, growing legs and wandering between scenes filmed in the artist’s
kitchen, bathroom, home office and other rooms. For Kids’ APT, Sawa presents
Every Little Thing Moving, a multimedia activity which enables young visitors to
join in and play with the imagery in elsewhere. By moving three-dimensional
objects over an image-sensitive tabletop, participants interact with and
contribute to the film. Sound effects play in tandem with the movements,
enabling children to create their own version of the artist’s original film,
including a rich and unexpected soundtrack.
Sawa’s film elsewhere 2003 screens in the space, as well as trail 2005, a later
film featuring the silhouettes of animals moving on the edge of shadows cast in
the artist’s apartment as day becomes night. A caravan of camels treks silently
around the plughole of the kitchen sink, and an elephant moves dreamily
across gloomy windows, while the silhouette of a Ferris wheel turns silently.
TW
To create Shirana Shahbazi’s painting for Kids’ APT, a workshop was
conducted at the Children’s Art Centre with a group of local Brisbane
children. Discussions introduced the painting project, the artist and her work,
as well as a brief history of the still-life genre, inspiring the participants to
compose their own still-life arrangements. The subject of the arrangements
was a range of tropical fruits, flowers and vegetation readily available in
Queensland. The resulting compositions of coconuts, hibiscus, foliage and
fruits were professionally photographed and sent to Shahbazi, who is based
in Zurich, Switzerland. The artist then selected an image and prepared it for
the next stage — the image was transformed into an immense painting by
billboard painters in Iran. After passing through many hands across the globe,
the end result is a collaborative painting on display in the Children’s Art
Centre for APT6.
KR
Marcel Meltherorong aka Mars Melto
New Caledonia/Vanuatu b.1975
Singsing with Marcel (stills) 2009
Commissioned for APT6 / Courtesy: The artist
Wit Pimkanchanapong
Thailand b.1976
Test image for I, you, we 2009
Commissioned for APT6 / Courtesy: The artist
Hiraki Sawa
Japan/United Kingdom b.1977
elsewhere (still) 2003
Digital video, black and white, silent, 7:40 minutes
Image courtesy: The artist, Ota Fine Arts, Tokyo;
James Cohan Gallery, New York
Shirana Shahbazi
Iran/Switzerland b.1974
Children’s workshop, Still life: Coconut and other things
2009, Gallery of Modern Art
Commissioned for APT6 / Courtesy: The artist /
Photographs: Natasha Harth
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