alison currie says...

42a is a unique and innovative installation that breathes new life into all forms of art. As previously announced, the exhibition has already made stops in Sydney and Brisbane, with Melbourne next on its list. Emerging Adelaide choreographer, dancer and director, Alison Currie, has us intrigued. More specifically, with her latest instalment, 42a.

Covered: An imagined space of houses and homes, a collaborative project, equal human beings, maintenance men behind the fridge.

Kluster: So, we hear 42a is a rather multifaceted affair, can you tell us a little more about the exhibition?

Alison Currie: 42a is multifaceted in that it incorporates many mediums. The work is based on and derived from ideas relating to house and home. It is a three dimensional installation that aims to immerse the viewer in the work. Many of the objects in the space are interactive, as is the dancing.

K: What inspired you to bring together dance, video, sound, media, sculpture and painting, all under the banner of the theme of house and home?

AC: In 2005 I travelled to the US to partake in an internship with the Builders Association media and performance company. I was interested in observing how various companies made work across mediums. I have always been influenced by my sister Bridget Currie’s visual art practice and am of the belief that dance is a visual art.

While I was away I started thinking of a work set in a house. From the house the work then moved to a gallery space as I wanted to be selective about what people saw. In the gallery I was able to choose which elements and draw focus as apposed to competing with the clutter of a whole house. I also wanted to draw from the imagined space of the home as well as the architectural and functional space, I felt a larger non residential space would provide more scope to explore this.

I always imaged that the work would have sculpture, video and sound. As soon as I realised the dance was going to be interactive I wanted the other elements to be interactive also, this was when the media artist Adam Synnott became involved. The collaborators were employed along the way, each of them at a time when I felt the work needed them and they each added a large component to the work. Every collaborator has worked beyond their medium by crossing over with others within the work.

Annemarie Kohn has been collaborating with me on this project as the video artist since the first development in 2006. She has also made sculptural elements within the work, directing the construction of a giant biscuit, cast postcards (that can be taken by visitors), the inclusion of real wallpaper as well as projected interactive wallpaper, to name a few.

Kel Mocilnik, the visual artist on the project, has created large sculptural and painting components of the work as well as dancing in 42a. He joined the project in the second development in 2007. Kel is not trained as a dancer in a formal sense, but I witnessed his ability and interest in dance and coaxed him into performing, he now also works with Restless Dance Theatre as a dancer, in Adelaide.

Adam Synnott also joined the project in 2007 as the media artist and a performer in the work. Adam worked closely with the video and sound artists to create interactive wallpaper video, an interactive biscuit on a tv screen, and an interactive doormat, which when you step on it you can hear the neighbours behind a door. Adam is unable to perform in the 2010 tour as he is in residence in Taipei.

Alisdair Macindoe did a small amount of work in the 2007 development and really came on board as a collaborator in 2008, creating a detailed and elaborate sound score for a painted corridor in the work, constructing a music box lettuce, working on the doormat sounds and others.

42a is a collaborative work with all of the artists contributing across mediums. The Dancers have also informed the construction of the work and been integral in the creation of the choreography. In this tour the dancers are Carlie Angel, Alison Currie, Kel Mocilnik and Lewis Rankin, they are all highly skilled performers who excel at the difficult task of behaving naturally in the space whilst remembering cues for movement, intentions behind the movement, and intricately choreographed sections of movement that correspond with those cues.

Dancers who have been involved with 42a in the past and have contributed to its creation are Ana Grosse, Kate Skully, Sol Ulbrich, Rachel Fenwick, Veronica Shum.

Solon Ulbrich has been a mentor to me as a choreographer during the creation of 42a.

K: Why the name, 42a?

AC: 42a refers to a street address.

K: Can you tell us a little bit more about you as an artist – I believe you have a history in chorography and dance? How was it you came to work in the creative industries?

AC: I dressed up and went to my sisters dance class when I was three, continued to study dance and realised that I’d like to keep doing so and if I was going to I’d have to do it as a profession. I studied a BA in Dance Performance at Adelaide Centre for the Arts (ACA) graduating in 2003. I always had a strong interest both in creating and performing dance.

I became more and more interested in creating dance for alternate spaces and unsuspecting audiences. This included, and still includes, working across disciplines both within my practice and in collaboration with other artists.

K: We’re interested to learn more about your perception of the connection between dance and exhibitions.

AC: I have seen quite a lot of performance art and some dance in galleries. I have observed that there is often a separation between audience and performer created by the attitude or direction of the performer, both in gallery and stage performance. In my work I want to acknowledge that we exist in the same space as equal humans, and in the case of 42a it is a house space so the interaction is quite relaxed. The performer and audience have conversations often whilst the performer is dancing. All the movement in 42a is choreographed but the order and space it takes place in is not. The dance movement is triggered by actions and reactions of the audience.

K: You are opening in Sydney tonight and then heading down to Melbourne next month. What can people expect from these exhibitions?

AC: They can expect to walk through the gallery as they would any other, but find dancers as well as objects reacting to them and their actions in the space. The longer they spend in the space the more they will see. There are many things to be found, for example behind the fridge there are maintenance men, but you might have to get on your hands and knees to find them. And the more you look for in the sculptures the more you will trigger in the dancing.

K: If you were asked to sum up 42a in three words, what would they be?

AC: Interactive, Experiential, homely

alison currie, 42a