Summary |
An exploration of the changing understandings of life by 26 contemporary artists. |
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Start Date |
Mar 19, 2021 11:00 am |
End Date |
May 8, 2021 5:00 pm |
Venue |
Plimsoll Gallery |
Exhibition dates: Friday 19 March - Saturday 8 May 2021
Ten Days opening hours: Friday 19th - Sunday 21 March, 11am – 5pm
Gallery Hours all other times: Tuesday - Saturday 11am- 5pm (during exhibitions)
Closed Sundays, Mondays and Public holidays
Gallery closed during Easter and mid-semester break: 2 - 6 April
Gallery entry and tickets
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Experimenta Life Forms explores the changing understandings of life in unexpected, playful and challenging ways.
Philosophers have wrestled with defining life for thousands of years. Experimenta Life Forms reveals how contemporary artists are approaching this perennial question, at a time when technological change and new research findings are making definitions of ‘life’ increasingly difficult to pin down. What new life forms are emerging through technological and biological adaptation and invention? Are our definitions of life shifting because of new scientific discoveries? How do First Nation’s epistemologies influence our ways of thinking and understanding life? How are notions of our place in the web of life changing now that research is identifying sentience in animals, plant-life, and maybe soon to be found in our machines?
Experimenta Life Forms is a timely exhibition featuring a diversity of artforms including robotics, bio-art, screen-based works, installations, participatory and generative art. The exhibition showcases 26 leading Australian and international artists whose work makes significant contribution to current dialogues about the changing landscape of life as we know it.
Curators: Jonathan Parsons and Lubi Thomas
Associate Curator: Jessica Clark
Experimenta Life Forms: International Triennial of Media Art, presenting at Plimsoll Gallery, University of Tasmania, 19 March - 8 May 2021
Image credit: Soul Shift (2018) by Justine Emard. Video still. Image courtesy of the artist
About the Exhibition Curators
Jonathan Parsons, Director and curator
Jonathan Parsons has over twenty five years of experience working as a curator, artistic director and creative producer in Australia and internationally. He initiated and was the Creative Director of Robotronica (2013 - 2019), a biennial festival of robotics and interactive design at QUT in Brisbane. He was the Director of ISEA2013 (International Symposium on Electronic Art) an international festival of art, technology and ideas in partnership with Vivid Sydney. He has artistically led and collaborated on a broad range of cultural programs and events across all art forms including for the State Library of Queensland, Queensland Art Gallery, Queensland Performing Arts Centre, Riverfestival, Byron Bay Writers Festival, Powerhouse Museum, Sydney Gay and Lesbian Mardi Gras Festival, Pacific Wave Festival, Adelaide Festival of the Arts, Awesome Festival and the London International Festival of Theatre.
Lubi Thomas , Curator
Lubi Thomas is an experienced curator working in the field of digital/new media arts and associate practice areas. In the past decade, she has developed and delivered an extensive range of exhibitions, projects, festivals, events, residencies and mentoring programs, as well as, public and education-focused programming. Lubi takes a networked and site-responsive approach to programme structures, audience engagement, and partnership development. She has developed cultural programming frameworks for The Cube Brisbane, Creative Industries Precinct QUT, and Qld State Library. Lubi has developed key partnerships with LEGO Education, Ars Electronica, FACT Liverpool, EMARE, and the Australia Council for the Arts to support these programming sites. Lubi wears many hats with her key activities being as an Independent Curator and Artist, Experimenta’s Curator @ Large and curatorial advisor to Digital Placemaking Institute. Lubi works and consults locally, nationally and internationally.
Jessica Clark, Associate Curator
Jessica Clark is a proud Palawa woman with English, Irish, Turkish, and French ancestry, currently living and working between Melbourne and Adelaide. She is a curator, arts manager, and writer with an independent practice that is driven by her distinct passion for sharing knowledge and cross-cultural engagement. Her curatorial projects have focused on promoting new dialogues, challenging preconceived ideas/ideals, and exploring the transformative and performative nature of art and contemporary curatorial practice.
Recent exhibitions include All of us (2018) at Blindside Gallery; standing still: looking back, looking forward (2018) at Incinerator Gallery; and Tell for the Sydney Festival (2018) and Ballarat International Foto Biennale (2017). Her writing portfolio is diverse and has been published through platforms such as Art Collector, Photofile, and Catalyst Magazine. As well as her role curating VIETNAM – ONE IN, ALL IN, she is also curating RMIT University’s large-scale public art commission, Wurrunggi Biik – Law of the Land (2019). Jessica is alumna of UNSW College of Fine Art, Australian Catholic University and RMIT University, having completed a Bachelor in Art Theory, postgraduate studies in Visual Art Education, and a Master of Arts Management respectively.
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