SATURDAY 29 NOVEMBER 2014, 12.00PM–4.30PM
Image David Brazier and Kelda Free, Untitled, film still, 2014.
Gertrude Contemporary’s Studio Artists will open their studios to the public for the afternoon of Saturday 29 November 2014, 12–4.30pm. This is an exclusive opportunity to visit the sixteen studios upstairs, view works in progress, and meet with the artists. It complements the annual Gertrude Studios exhibition, Part Two of which is currently on display.
Gertrude’s current Studio Artists are Ross Coulter, Sean Bailey, Tully Moore, Claire Lambe, Sarah CrowEST, Jess Johnson, Sean Peoples, Scott Miles, Danae Valenza, Helen Grogan, Søren Dahlgaard, Hamishi Farah, Bridie Lunney, Alasdair McLuckie and Charlie Sofo.
The current Studio 18 artists in residence are London-based collaborative duo David Brazier and Kelda Free, who will present work developed during their Gertrude Contemporary residency alongside an existing work called Virtual Employee (2010) at the open day. The Virtual Employee project involved the outsourcing of their 2009 New Delhi residency to an Indian business process outsourcing company. As they left India, virtual employee Ashish Sharma began a period of employment as International Artist in Residence and worked with communities in Delhi to fulfil the residency’s objectives, delivering his results through Skype conversations, mobile phone photographs and emailed reports. For the first time in the work’s presentation Sharma will be available via Skype during the Open Studio Day to discuss and answer questions about his experience and the impact the project has had upon him.
Since arriving in Melbourne, Brazier and Free have been working with groups around Melbourne, including the Asylum Seeker Resource Centre and students from Fitzroy Primary School, to explore ideas about migration, shifting borders and increased cultural proximity.
Additionally, Studio Artist Helen Grogan’s installation for Gertrude Studios Part Two is a series of enacted propositions, one of which will take place at 2.30pm during the Open Studio Day in the main gallery space.
Gertrude Contemporary’s Studio Program has provided practical support and professional advocacy for many of Australia’s leading contemporary artists since its inception as an artist studio complex in 1983. The program, which consists of sixteen non-residential studios, is available to emerging and mid-career artists, and is provided for two-year tenures.
David Brazier and Kelda Free’s residency at Gertrude Contemporary is supported by an Australian Artists’ Grant, a NAVA initiative, made possible through the generous sponsorship of Mrs Janet Holmes à Court and the support of the Australia Council for the Arts.
GERTRUDE CONTEMPORARY, 200 Gertrude St, Fitzroy, www.gertrude.org.au