Yesterday on SmartArts...

Mark Hilton – Collective Autonomy
Gertrude Contemporary Art Spaces
200 Gertrude Street Fitzroy, until June 24

Opening Hours: Tue - Fri 11am-5.30pm, Sat 1-5.30pm
200 Gertrude Street Fitzroy
Victoria 3065 Australia
T: +61 3 9419 3406
www.gertrude.org.au

Mark Hilton’s Collective Autonomy is a breathtaking sequence of exquisitely detailed light boxes, whose confronting subject matter challenges us to rethink our notions of contemporary Australian culture.

Each light box is executed in a traditional cultural style – Medieval fresco, ancient Persian court painting and Chinese coffin-lid carving. Despite these diverse and historical aesthetic approaches, the works allegorically grapple with unsettling socio-political events in present-day Australia. These include the notorious stabbing deaths at Melbourne’s Salt Nightclub in 2003, and the alleged culture of sexual abuse in Australia’s elite football teams. Considered together, the works in Collective Autonomy serve as a reflection, memorial, and unflinching critical investigation into some of the darker aspects of Australian culture.


Sally Hussey & Matthew Molony - Film Fest @ Falls
9 – 11 June
Falls Creek
Tickets and accomodation: 1800 232 557

The third annual Film Fest @ Falls is to take place on the opening weekend of the 2006 ski season at Falls Creek, 9 – 11 June. Hosted by the Falls Creek Alpine Resort Management Board, the festival celebrates Australian Filmmaking, providing a forum for emerging filmmakers to introduce their work to industry representatives.

The festival centres on a short film competition that screens over 40 works across 3 days. Entrants are vying for over $30,000 in prizes awarded for Best Film, Best Script, Best Director and Highly Commended Film(s). Prizes are awarded by an independent Jury, made up of industry professionals. Film Fest @ Falls has a strong focus on script writing: the foundation element of successful film making.

Other highlights include a 20th anniversary screening of the Australian film Malcolm, which directors Nadia Tass and David Parker in attendance; and a work-in-progress screening of a yet to be released, new Australian feature West, by first time feature director Daniel Kridge. This will be followed by a Q & A session with the film’s creative team and a number of the cast.


Jacqueline Ogeil - Artistic Director - Woodend Winter Arts Festival
9 – 12 June 2006

Following the success of last year’s inaugural Woodend Winter Arts Festival this unique celebration of the arts is being held again this year over the Queen’s Birthday Weekend in June.

Music, film and literature will be showcased at several venues around the town of Woodend over the three day weekend, including performances by the Tank Stream Quartet, poet Chris Wallace-Crabb, and a retrospective screening of the works of film-maker Paul Cox.


Playwright Lally Katz - LALLY KATZ AND THE TERRIBLE MYSTERIES OF THE VOLCANO

Lally Katz and the Terrible Mysteries of the Volcano is the new show from award-winning independent theatre company, Stuck Pigs Squealing (The Eisteddfod, The Black Swan of Trespass). It is a metaphysical fairy tale for adults, set in three timezones, in a post-apocalyptic Canberra. Featuring a rich live sound score by Jethro Woodward, lighting design by Richard Vabre and a fantastical design by Adam Gardnir, the audience is taken on a ride into a bittersweet world of memory, love and loss.

$15 Preview June 1 @8pm
June 2 – 18, Tues – Sat @8pm; Sun @5pm
Tickets $27/ $18
Bookings: 9534 3388 or www.theatreworks.org.au
Theatreworks,14 Acland Street, St Kilda

Stomp @ Her Majesty’s Theatre, Exhibition St – on now until June 4
Friday 8:00pm
Saturday 2:00pm and 8:00pm
Sunday 1:00pm and 5:00pm
Ticketek General Bookings on 132 849 or www.hermajestystheatre.com.au

STOMP is an exuberant display of physical prowess, music, dance energy and wit. It is a performance guaranteed to set the pulse racing with a jiving cacophony of amazing percussion on the move, using everyday household objects in non-traditional ways: garbage bins, brooms, drums and matches create extraordinary music and dance. With its high energy, fast moving and very physical dynamic mix of bodies, objects and sounds, abstract ideas are performed with humour and theatrical flair.

Now into its 14th year of touring world-wide, STOMP is a truly remarkable theatrical phenomenon, having played over 10,000 performances to over 10 million people in 42 countries across five continents. Quite simply, there is nothing else in the world like it.


Eugene von Nagy – Vanguard Gallery & Jake Hoerner – Kick Gallery
Northern Exposure 2006

Exhibitions, openings, demonstrations and interactive activities
Showcasing Visual Arts in High Street Northcote

Opening 6-9pm Friday June 9
Continues Saturday June 10 & Sunday June 11

Northern Exposure 2006 is a multi-venue arts festival in High Street Northcote. After the success of the inaugural NE festival in 2005 NE06 is set to once again highlight the numerous arts venues and creative community of Melbourne’s new arts and entertainment precinct – High Street Northcote.

As part of Northern Exposure 2006, Vanguard Gallery presents:
Friday 9th June, 6-9pm: Festival opening, including exhibition openings in six galleries, street performances and events in various venues along High St Northcote.

VANGUARD GALLERY
234 High St Northcote VIC 3070
Tel +61 3 9481 4840
vanguardgallery.com.au


Red Stitch Theatre Company present:
TEJAS VERDES by Fermin Cabal. Translated by Robert Shaw.

AUSTRALIAN PREMIERE
May 31st - July 1st, 2006
Wed-Sat 8pm, Sundays 6.30pm (dur 75 mins)
No show Thurs 15 June

One night a young, pretty woman, Colorina, vanishes in Santiago. Her subsequent fate is recounted and questioned by those close to her. What really happened? What happened to the thousands just like her?

Tejas Verdes (Green Gables), once a seaside hotel, became an infamous Chilean torture and detention centre during the Pinochet dictatorship in the mid 1970's. Cabal's humane and poetic work evokes the horror of systematic brutality, the lives of the 'Disappeared', and the burden of truth that weighs on those left behind.

"Cabal...combines insistent poetic motifs with hard prosaic detail...a remarkable act of collective memory" (Michael Billington, The Guardian)

DIRECTED BY JONATHAN MESSER ("Vincent in Brixton")
With Verity Charlton, Olivia Connolly, Kate Cole,
and special guests: Evelyn Krape and Laura Lattuada.

REAR 2 CHAPEL ST, ST KILDA (Opp. Astor)
BOOKINGS 9533 8083 $30 (Conc. $20)

***BOOK ONLINE: SAVE MONEY AND TIME***
Discount Tickets and Free Subscriber bookings
now available at www.redstitch.net/bookings.

Plus regular segments A Fistful of Celluloid with Cerise Howard, and arts news & gossip segment Shoot the Messenger with Lucinda Straughn.