2021 in Review

It is the final day of 2021. Time to take harvest. Today i'm updating my portfolio with a range of projects that came to light in this year. 2021 was a transformative time for me, becoming a father and embracing all the excitement and challenges that come along with that, I was fortunate to find time to work on some incredible projects and collaborate with many other talented artists, activists and performers.

Selfless Orchestra x Barefoot Bands
Members of the Orchestra travelled out to the desert to do some recording with Drew Goddard in the old Coolgardie Train station - the results of which will be coming out in 2022

Photo by Mel Drummond

The Epic of Gilgamesh @ Perth Festival w/ The Church of Belligerence

https://www.alyian.com.au/epic-of-gilgamesh-perth-festival-2021

Ninja brought back the Epic with aplomb, and we took it to The Rechabite with the help of the church - expect to see more of this in 2022 as we ramp up this reboot of this tale and take it to some even bigger stages and locations - TBA!

Photo by Adrian Thomson

Museum of Freedom and Tolerance - In Visible Ink 2021

https://www.alyian.com.au/mft-invisible-ink-2021

I was honoured to be asked to take care of the media and production for this crucial event at the WA Museum, showcasing marginalised voices in art and activism over 4 days.

Photo by Amber Bateup

Daniel T Searle - 'Poet's Dream' / 'Omnipolar'

https://www.alyian.com.au/danieltsearlepoetsdreamomnipolar

I finally finished the recordings of my late and loved friend Dan, releasing the music we recorded together years before, a double album in tribute to his memory. Miss you brotherman!

Injured Ninja - Gulnare Funk

https://www.alyian.com.au/injured-ninja-gulnare-funk

Our most insane video yet finally came out, Weekend at Epstein's style. Huge love to Dom for co-ordinating this hilarious shoot.

Deanna Hitti - 'Object of the Game'

https://www.alyian.com.au/object-of-the-game

I dived deep into backgammon, creating this projection mapped A/V and sound installation at Fremantle Arts Centre for Deanna's exhibition

Injured Ninja @ Dark Mofo 2021

https://www.alyian.com.au/injured-ninja-dark-mofo-2021

Ninja got the dream gig of travelling into the dark depth of Tassie in winter to perform at Dark Mofo. We a thrilled to pull it off. We took our 6 week old baby and he made friends with Thurston Moore. The best of times.

Photo by Adam DeVille

Tiller Rides

https://www.alyian.com.au/tiller-rides-crowdsourcing-video-2021

I hooked up with the geniuses at Tiller Rides to showcase their new electric bike which is now going into production! Congregations to the whole team!

Exoterica IV @ The Cannery Arts Centre

https://www.alyian.com.au/exoterica-iv-kepa-kurl-1

I was Artist in Residence at The Cannery in September and put together this massive multi projection and sound installation reflecting on my time in this beautiful region.

Wilyabrup Vertical Dance Video
The incredible Brenna Day asked me to produce the video for this gravity defying dance. Beautiful. Not yet released - so stay tuned to see the final product next year

APS Integration Circles
The Australian Psychedelic Society asked for assistance in hosting safe spaces for community building and harm reduction around substance use, four weeks of what we now realise was an essential space that was needed by many people in our community.

Mundaring Arts Centre
MAC asked me to help out with their Food for Thought, Hold and Nalda Searles exhibitions this year co-ordinating videography and promotion. It's always great working with the team at MAC and I look forward to doing some more work with you in the new year.

Injured Ninja - Additional Impact! Surplus Damage! Remix EP
Ninja put its stems out into the wild and came back with an awesome compilation of remixes that came out in December.

A Long Overdue Update to this Website + A few extras from 2020!

As we move into 2021, i’ve taken time to update this portfolio site with many of the projects that I managed to complete in the last year. A lot of these were not initially planned, as we got hit with the big changes of 2020 a lot of my proposed projects, films and exhibitions were cancelled. For a while there, I really lost my mojo, unsure of where to channel my efforts.

Thus, I turned my attention homewards to Western Australia and worked on more local projects. The pace picked up throughout the year and once we reached momentum - I had hardly any time to reflect or record any of those projects!

And come the start of this year, i’ve been exhausted, but I decided before the machine cranks up again, best to reflect on what I created and collaborated on in 2020 - and I realise its amazing what actually transpired last year with the lockdowns and undue negative effects on the entertainment and arts industries. I’m lucky to be able to say i’ve done much at all. Huge gratitude to everyone who came in and out of my creative projects last year, we are truly blessed!

I’ve just added new pages for some of the projects that came to fruition last year including:

Stelarc - Reclining Stickman - A new project I worked in assistance to Stelarc - a massive 6 meter tall robot at the Art Gallery of South Australia

Vic Park Projection Fest 2020 - A curation of local video projection artists painting Albany Highway in light - hopefully the first of many installments!

TURA Inverted Harmonic Environment - My first new project in lockdown a five piece experimental sound and video peice

If It Ain't Baroque - Fix it! - A Web series interviewing Perth Music and Art talent hosted not-your-usual-but-totally-amazing host the legendary drag performer Ash Baroque, featuring interviews with Peter Bibby, Nick Allbrook (Pond), Scarlett Stevens (San Cisco), Strykermeyer and Joni in the Moon.

Enliven Online Music and Arts Festival - A massive 5 week online music and arts festival, presented by Visit Perth / City of Perth and featuring a massive array of West Australian artists across five venues. This was huge!

‘A Limitless Tomorrow’ featuring Selfless Orchestra - A video poem that goes all across Western Australia featuring members of Selfless Orchestra playing in incredible locations where human intervention has protected or restored the natural environment

Remember Their Names - A guerrilla projection mapping project for the Black Lives Matter protests

Doublethink Prism ‘#PAVLOVA’ - A very sexy pavlova eating music video and new song for Doublethink Prism

Selfless Orchestra 'Great Barrier' Studio Album - The release of Selfless Orchestra’s first full length album ‘Great Barrier’

Injured Ninja Total Impact! Maxx Damage! - The first new Ninja record in almost 10 years, a 5 track EP of Face-Melting new music

Plus here’s a few little bonus things not listed here, in my downtime during lockdown I got back into some editing projects and busted out a couple of great clips in the middle of the year, check these out:

San Cisco - ‘On the Line’

Peter Bibby - ‘Whyalla’

May we continue to grow in these creative communities and stay strong and connected in this new year.

New Podcast Interview with Stuart Watkins

Steven is a practitioner in synchronistic digital technologies in sound and visual mediums, incorporating performance, installation and composition in exploring the facets of sensory perception working in an array of fields in the realms of entertainment, information and environmental activism. Steven is also a Yogi and all around amazing person.

Online now: I did an in-depth interview for Stuart Watkins' podcast - discussing my work with Camp Doogs, Selfless Orchestra, Stelarc and my upcoming ABC TV + iview series Biogenesis due out later this year. Thanks for having me, Stu!

itunes: https://itunes.apple.com/au/podcast/the-stuart-watkins-podcast/id1435966879

Youtube: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Pkfdpt46eM4

2017 Thus Far... CellF, Protectors, PIAF and more Stelarc

This year has been intense so far, with many exciting projects in the works. In addition to a national tour with Doublethink Prism (www.doublethinkprism.com), I was lucky enough to attend the 2017 summer installment of MOFO, the Museum of Old and New Art (Mona) Festival of Music and Art (otherwise known as Mona Foma) in Hobart, Tasmania in January with the team behind 'CellF' the world's first neural synthesiser. I have been following the team for the past few years, documenting their journey from concept to realisation and in time this will hopefully result in a full length documentary about their daring experiment.

CellF in performance with Okkyung Lee, Museum of Old and New Art (Mona), Hobart, Jan 22nd, 2017

More info: guybenary.com/work/cellf/

https://mofo.net.au/lineup/mofo-at-mona/cellf/

I donated some more time to assisting the Beeliar Wetlands Protectors effort here in Perth, Western Australia. Avoiding the senseless destruction of precious endangered environments is everybody's responsibility. A video de-bunking a government propaganda production had a viral reaction, picking apart blatant misinformation with factual references.

I was fortunate enough to join the team for the opening of the Perth International Arts Festival (PIAF) 2017 - Boorna Waanginy: The Trees Speak. Helping bring this epic, culturally charged and vibrant work to life over a huge canopy of trees in Kings Park. The result was nothing short of magical.

I teamed up with Stelarc once more, documenting his project 'StickMan' a collaboration with artist Petro Vouris.

Stelarc and I will be travelling to Eindhoven, Netherlands next month to the STRP Biennale to create another iteration of our 'Re-wired / Re-mixed' project that premiered at PICA, Perth July last year.

https://strp.nl/en/

And to top it all off, final touches on the second full length 'Usurper of Modern Medicine' Album were completed, I look forward to releasing this new record later in 2017.

Protectors of the Beeliar Wetlands

A short look at some of the humans who are standing up against senseless and unapproved development of a Toll Road through some of the last remaining wetlands in the Perth city area recorded on Wednesday December 21st, 2016.

Stelarc: Rewired / Remixed

My new collaborative project with Stelarc has just been launched. Opening on July 30th as part of the Perth Institute of Contemporary Arts (PICA) Radical Ecologies Program, it is now on display and will be exhibited in a performance by Stelarc from August 3rd to 7th.

Head to http://rewiredremixed.stelarc.org/ now to take part in an interactive artwork now until September 4th. Send control messages to the robot remotely from the online interface.

ReWired / ReMixed by Stelarc

Projection Co-ordination and Media Production by Steven Aaron Hughes

Engineering, Exoskeleton Arm by Rodney Parsons

Programming, Exoskeleton Arm Control, Touchscreen & Web Interface by Steve Berrick

Radical Ecologies will feature an exciting and ambitious new project from Stelarc, a performance artist famous for technological interventions to his own body. Titled Re-Wired / Re-Mixed: Event for Dismembered Body, 3-7 August, is a five-day internet enabled performance, that explores the physiological and aesthetic experience of a fragmented, distributed, de-synchronized, distracted and involuntary body – wired and under surveillance. The artist wears a HUD (head up display) that enables him to see with the “eyes” of someone in London, whilst hearing with the “ears” of someone in New York. The body is also augmented by an 8 degrees-of-freedom exoskeleton so that anyone anywhere can generate involuntary movement of his right arm, using an on-line interface. The artist becomes optically and acoustically de-synchronized and performs partly involuntarily. It’s as if the body has been electronically dismembered, spatially distributed and possessed with multiple agency.

Send commands to Stelarc’s Robotic Arm using this online interface.

View the robot moving to your commands in the gallery at PICA (Perth Institute of Contemporary Arts) via the live video stream.

Stelarc will be performing the gallery for the following dates

(All dates and times are Australian Western Standard Time (AWST)

Wednesday August 3rd / 11:00am to 5:00pm

Thursday August 4th / 11:00am to 5:00pm

Friday August 5th / 01:00pm to 7:00pm

Saturday August 6th / 11:00am to 5:00pm

Sunday August 7th / 11:00am to 5:00pm

Sam Maher - Fremantle Handpan

Performance Video of Perth musician Sam Maher, produced and recorded by myself in the quaint backyard of Amber Fresh last week. The handpan (hang drum) is a sublime instrument and it was a nice project to try and capture the sound and performance faithfully.

Watch the performance at Sam's Youtube channel below.

PS Arts Space Fremantle - Hidden Treasures I - July 7th to 13th

http://www.psas.com.au/pages/now_and_future/hidden_treasures_i/

HIDDEN TREASURE I
NEW WORK BY ALYIAN in response to JACOB DIAMOND & USURPER OF MODERN MEDICINE

PS Art Space and the City of Fremantle have commissioned four video artists to create new work in response to the musical programming (curated by Davey Craddock) for the Hidden Treasures Festival in Fremantle.

Artists Statement: "During Usurper of Modern Medicine’s performance I will presenting synchronised geometric visuals that dynamically react to the music that call upon ancient symbolism and architecture, and before, and after our set I will be showing scenes from Exoterica II - a projection mapped performance piece I exhibited in Iceland in November 2015 that uses Nordic mythological motifs combined with natural imagery of Iceland, meshing human and environmental forms."

Opening
Thursday 7 July 2016, 8pm-11.30pm
Read more here
FB Event

Screenings
Fri 8 July, Tue 12 July & Wed 13 July, 10am-4pm

Image courtesy of Steven Aaron Hughes