Vic Park Projection Fest 2020

Presented by the Vic Park Collective | Sat March 23rd, 2020

I was asked by my close friend Zoe O’Neill to assist in the curation of an inaugural light and projection mapping festival for the town of Victoria Park in Perth, Western Australia. For the first edition of this fest we curated a lineup of local artists to paint the buildings of Albany Highway with art for a night in March 2020.

Performance Documentation

Video shot by Ben Berkhout, Edited by Dominic Pearce

Official Media Release

The inaugural Vic Park Projection Fest (presented by the Vic Park Collective) presents four projection/audio-visual art pieces, each illuminating a different concept of ‘place’, as it applies to Victoria Park. From the ancient roots and continuing living history and culture as Aboriginal land, and Noongar Boodja, through historical aspects and documented physical history of the commercial strip, to a tongue in cheek reference to the car yards and main motor channel that have characterised Vic Park’s recent history to a metaphysical or emotional experience of local living and community, expressed in more abstract colour and movement.

Featuring some of Perth’s premiere projection/AV artists, the Vic Park Projection Festival is a community based arts event that aims to activate areas of Victoria Park and the much beloved Albany Hwy strip and repurpose it’s nooks and crannies as a live canvas to promote community, connectivity and curiosity. The #Vicparkprojectionfest boasts five prominent Perth artists artists to engage local audiences, reward those who may stroll off the beaten track, bring together community to discuss and appreciate art as well as activate spaces by, quite literally, bringing them into the light; Look up and see familiar places a-new.

1 Nene Chicken / Old Studio - 871 Albany Hwy

“Freedom of Movement”

by Charmaine Cole & Steven Alyian

Celestial motion from the moon flows through the elements of water, plants and fire. A tapestry of indigenous art that explores conservation, bush food, the courage of our elders and sacred union of woman and man. A cyclical movement of spirit seeking purpose and connection to our land.

Charmaine Cole belongs to both the Kanlyang and Koreng Noongar Nations of South West Australia. A Perth based visual and digital artist, researcher and photographer, she has completed two solo exhibitions for NAIDOC and has been showcased at Kaleidoscope Festival in Joondalup and Lightbox Laneway in the City of Vincent.

Steven Alyian is a musical composer, video artist, film-director, event organiser and activist. Steven hosts large scale public events that challenge political norms and encourage positive interaction with the natural environment. Blending the organic and technological, Steven has travelled the world creating artworks, performances and films that investigate the power of consciousness through creativity.

2 Equality Psychology - 874 Albany Hwy

“Time and Place”

by Seb Becker

#virtualexpeditions @virtualexpeditions

Virtual Expeditions is the creative outlet for Sebastian Becker, a VJ and installation artist that specialises in projection mapping and light artworks that encourage audiences to reimagine the world around them. “Time and Place”; the rich visual history of Victoria Park is being remembered, or was that a dream? The effect of time on a place and on a memory is explored using projection mapping and archival images from the Victoria Park area.

3 Cape of Good Dumplings Laneway - 869 Albany Hwy

“Interactive Place”

by Steve Berrick

Steve Berrick is an artist and creative coder. Founding member of the ololo art collective. His works are software driven experiences for interactive systems and performance; sometimes visual; sometimes aural; sometimes informative. He enjoys process, collaboration and presenting projects to audiences in galleries, theatres, museums and the street.

4 Beulah International - 906 Albany Hwy

“Traffic Triggered Synthesizer”

by Bullet Train 4 Australia, presented in conjunction with the Vic Park Community Centre

Using a modified traffic counter provided by MetroCount, traffic on Albany Hwy will be generating a live audio/visual show, temporarily turning one of Perth’s major transit corridors in to an instrument. Bullet Train 4 Aus (Bt4a) are an experimental audio/visual outfit passionate about high speed rail. Due to a lack of such infrastructure, the team have taken to using public roads within their work. The shows are entirely improvised, harnessing rhythmic patterns found in the urban environment to form a dialogue with place.

Samuel Newman - Sound Design

Ben Aguero - Sound Design

Tom Rogers - Visual Artist

Mitchell Mackintosh - Software design/coding

Albany Hwy Vehicles - Performers