Over Many Horizons (O|M|H), Solo Exhibition

ABOUT:
Over Many Horizons (O|M|H) is an interactive, experiential 'whole of gallery' exhibition that investigates the mesh of environmental, social and cultural ecologies that form our worlds, asking how might we re-imagine our place and actions within those networks as ‘re-futuring’ - i.e. acting in ways that ‘give time back’, rather than ‘take time away’, from the future.

Audiences navigate the works non-linearly, encountering robotically controlled kinetic light works, telescopic tunnels of ethereal imagery and sound and gently pulsing, ambiguous surfaces. The exhibition dovetails with a range of specially curated participative events and art-science-humanities discussions that ask, why is today’s environmental crisis a crisis of ‘us’, and how must we therefore evolve?

Over Many Horizons (O|M|H) therefore necessarily spans art, science and the humanities, and initiates a collaboration UTS Marine and Life Sciences, Professor William Gladstone - marine biologist and Head of School of Life Sciences, The Living Data program with Lisa Roberts, the UTS Institute For Sustainable Futures (Tania Leimbach) and curator/artist An Marosszeky. In all of these ways Over | Many | Horizons (O|M|H) seeks to shine a light upon the silent, shadowy barriers of cultural misunderstanding that prevent us from re-inventing ourselves as a future-sustaining species.

LIST OF WORKS:

Deep Ecology | Horizon 1

Seasonal | Horizon 2

O Tswellang | Horizon 3

Shifting Dusts | Horizon 4

Inter State | Horizon 5

SHOWINGS:
1: Solo show, Over Many Horizons, UTS Gallery, Ultimo, Sydney, Aug 3rd - Sept 28th 2016, (An official event of National Science Week), Opening 6-8pm, August 2nd, 2016. Public programs detailed below.

TEAM:
Keith Armstrong (Artistic director),  Contributions from Luke Lickfold (Sound Composition/MaxMSP Design), Lawrence English (sound) and many others (see links to individual works). Thanks also to prior collaborators, and inspirations drawn from Stu Lawson's visual designs.

PARTNER COLLABORATORS:
UTS Gallery (Tania Creighton (Curator) and Eleanor Zeichner (Assistant curator)), Living Data (Lisa Roberts), UTS Life Sciences (Prof. William Gladstone), National Science Week 2016, Sydney Science Week 2016, Sydney Design 2016, UTS Institute for Sustainable Futures, QUT Creative Industries, Dr. Ricardo Peach, Programme for Innovation in Artform Development (PIAD) - Vrystaat Kunstefees/Arts Festival/Tsa-Botjhaba, University Free State Centre Development Support, Qala Phelang Tala, Anita Venter, Angela De Jesus, Johannes Stegmann Art Gallery, University of the Free State, South Africa, The Andrew W. Mellon Foundation, The Flanders Foundation, Thabang Mofokeng, HOT Rural Workers Collective, Botshabelo Township, South Africa, Charlotte Vincent, Guy Webster, TC Howard, Vincent Dance Theatre.

This project has been assisted by the Australian Government through the Australia Council for the Arts, its arts funding and advisory body.

Keith Armstrong is supported by a part time senior research role at QUT Creative Industries.

FURTHER DETAILS:
The exhibition both references and extends upon two decades of ecologically-engaged (ecosophical) practices and introduces an important new art-science collaboration.

Ideas will be embodied both by audience experience of the works and through public programs, developed in association with National Science Week. By drawing upon experts from the arts, marine science, cultural studies and politics who in normal situations may rarely interact, but who now share a common sense of urgency to engage with sustaining Australia’s long-term social and environmental future, we will seek to deepen the intellectual framework for this exhibition, which is designed to trigger public engagement, debate and interaction.

The exhibition therefore invests in our collective capacities to discuss, disagree and seek fundamental cultural solutions to profoundly ‘wicked’, big picture questions such as Climate Change and marine biodiversity loss - apparently intractable questions that require us to confront social change, creativity and our species fundamental unsustainability, in radically new ways that are still difficult to imagine, discuss or enact.

MORE ON PUBLIC PROGRAMS:
These programs, produced by UTS Gallery in association with the School of Life Sciences and the Institute for Sustainable Futures at UTS, will comprise talks, artist-led workshops, and education activities, offered free to the general public throughout National Science Week and for the duration of the exhibition. These programs will offer audiences experience in processing and interpreting scientific data via artistic processes, hands-on workshops, educational programs on imaginative responses to science, and a talks series that explores the Sci-Art ideas in connection to the exhibition and future practices.

These programs trial innovative approaches to understanding science and social contexts, developing conversations across the divide between art and science, using the visual and experiential tools of arts practice to communicate complex ideas about the environment and its cultural dimensions. The program also fosters partnerships between the UTS as a research institution, UTS Gallery as a cultural organisation and the broader community.

LUNCHTIME TALK
When Options Run Out, What Can Art Do?
Wednesday 17 August, 1pm
Join us for a special lunchtime talk with artist Keith Armstrong on the research and practice behind his exhibition, Over Many Horizons.

PANEL DISCUSSION
New Horizons: Art For Complex Times
Thursday 18 August, 6pm
Despite decades of warning our species remains as unsustainable as ever. What if arts/science partnerships are the answer to help shift this deep-seated stasis? This panel brings together artists, theorists and scientists to ask the big question – how can we work together for climate sustainability? Speakers include: Keith Armstrong, Bill Gladstone, Jeremy Walker and Tania Leimbach.

WORKSHOP
Future Horizons
Saturday 20 August, 12 - 4pm
What does the future look like to you? Visit UTS Gallery for a drop-in workshop to share your vision, and to explore Over Many Horizons, an interactive exhibition that investigates the environmental, social and cultural ecologies that form our worlds and how we can create new paths to sustainability.