WORN TO BE WILD centres around what can loosely be defined as looking into the power dynamics in textiles and clothes (historic and/or contemporary) and playing with power-reclamation/empowerment though garments and skin/wear related materials. The project brings together emerging artists with varied practices sharing a research or material-based interest in textiles and the power that can be held in garments, pursuing subversions and celebrations through creative practice.

Schoolhouse Studios Residency
Studio Project 1 February 2020 - 15 March 2020

WORN TO BE WILD began with the invited artists working and researching together in a studio space provided during a residency at Schoolhouse Studios. This residency was intended to continue through April and culminate in an exhibition at the Schoolhouse Gallery but was interrupted by COVID lockdowns.

Studio provided at Schoolhouse Studios during the residency, 2020.

COLLABORATING ARTISTS:

KORI/SEAN MILES

kori/Sean Miles (Ngāti Raukawa, Ngāti Ahuru) is a cute queer trickster, artist and performer, respectfully doing their mahi (work/art) in unceded Kulin territory. Their trans-disciplinary practice includes, but is not limited to; performance, photography, video, sculpture, installation and poetry. Their practice weaves together; their whakapapa, non-binary identity, queer ecology, ritual, eroticism, pop culture, cult films, body horror, pranks, reindigenised posthumanist theory and biodiversity.

“I want to base my project on scent and visions of the new world. My inspirations are; the scratch n sniff cards John Waters made to corresponded with his film Polyester, the doctors masks worn during The Black Death that had bird-like beaks in which they held herbs and Māori Rongoā. Pre COVID-19, I made a mould of a P2 mask in response to the Bushfires. My idea was to make flesh-like latex masks that imagine a future where the air is so toxic that masks evolve to become part of our faces. Expanding upon this idea, I would like to facilitate online interactive performance workshops for the other seven participating artists to inspire creative ways of envisioning our potential futures. I will custom make masks for the participants. I will instruct the participants to source materials from their domestic environment in response to a topic.”

KAI A TE AHI! (detail), 2019. — *KAI A TE AHI!* (detail), 2019.

Refer to kori/Sean Miles’ website www.seanmilesartist.com for further works and their CV.

©JanelleLow_SiyingZhou_Bundoora_ThoseMonumentsDontKnowUs-19.jpg — SIYING ZHOU

Born in China, Siying Zhou is an installation artist, living and working in Melbourne/the land of the Kulin nation. Her art practice is predominantly research-based. Her works embody her interests in food, cultural difference and cultural identity of immigrants. Zhou tends to use spatial structure and materiality of various media, such as, video, photography, performance, drawings and text, to create a narrative space that encompasses multiple cultural, historical and political perspectives. By building a rich sensory navigation in her installation space, Zhou intends to lure the audience to question their own understanding on epistemology and the division between self and others.
Zhou is the winner of Linden Art Prize 2018. Zhou’s artworks have been exhibited nationally and internationally and also included in private collections. In last five years, Zhou has participated in artist residencies in Barcelona (2013), Berlin (2016), the Australian Tapestry Workshop (2018), and Ararat Art Gallery TAMA (2019). Zhou is a recipient of the John and Mary Kerley International Travel Scholarship in 2016, and the National Gallery of Victoria Women’s Association Award twice at VCA Art Masters graduation exhibition opening ceremony in 2015 and 2017.

ABOVE: The installation view of We Are Here For Your Happiness at Bundoora Homestead Art Centre in the group exhibition Those Monuments Don’t Know Us, 2019. Photography by Janelle Low.