The Seddon Snapshots Public Art Project

Many years ago, back in 2005, I cofounded a small community photo exhibition in my new home suburb of Seddon. I loved my new home, but I was struggling to feel like I belonged. I was 7 years post brain injury and although I had decided to break free of the disabling disability services mindset, and to live independently in the community, I didn't yet know how to create my new life. When I visited the local street shops or went to local community events, none of my disabled friends were there. The shops often weren't accessible, support wasn't available and many people didn't feel safe or included. And so in a possibly naive and idealistic way, we decided to create an event that would be inclusive of everyone, not just able bodied people. And we would put the project right in the middle of that community where we were invisible.

That first year in 2006, we met in the local park a few times, supported each other to take photos and the local council disability worker helped out. We found a shop willing to put in a temporary ramp that we had built and we invited all our disabled friends to come and put up or view our photo exhibition. 

And every year, the project grew, until in 2011, there was nearly 200 entries displayed in over 20 shop windows. 

I left that year, to focus on my own art studies. (The project has happened 3 times since, led by different locals, although sadly without much attention to being inclusive of people who are marginalised or with disability.)

Anyway, over the past 2 years, with my new art skills, I have been dreaming of undertaking a new local project, to take some of the photographic entries, blow them up really big and put them up on walls throughout Seddon.

And this year has finally seen my health improve enough to undertake this ambitious project. (Except that it turned out to be even more ambitious than I had imagined!) 

In the past 2 months, I have been working really hard to install 20 large artworks across public street walls across Seddon and beyond. I have had some great new and old friends help out.

These works are about 1.6 x 2m. Some of them are really high up. 

So far they have received very favourable attention and only minimal 'tagging'. 

I am exhausted but proud! And once again, I feel more connected to my community. And hopefully. others will too.

Thanks to all the owners of the brick walls who have granted me permission to use them. Thanks to all the people who helped choose the final 20 out of 800 past Snapshots of Seddon entries. And thanks to Maribyrnong Council for giving me a small grant to undertake this project.

Here's a few pics.

And here is a map so that you can find them all.

Marking the Anniversary with Vitruvius

Marking the Anniversary with Vitruvius, etching, 35 x 26cm

"Eighteen years ago, my life was turned upside down by a brain injury, requiring me to rebuild a life based on a person who thought, felt, saw and heard the world differently to the one I had known for 29 years. I also found myself with a new birth date, an anniversary that each year presents me with a confusing dilemma of celebratory survival and deeply felt loss. 

My 18th anniversary found me taking comfort in the studies of Vitruvius and Leonardo da Vinci: both scholars, separated by 14 centuries, and fascinated by the relationship of the body to the universe.

Taking my lead from Leonardo’s 1490 drawing, Vitruvian Man, using the same dimensions, body proportions and mirror writing that he used, I created my own manifesto to mark my entry into adulthood, using my extensive studies of the body in pain and exploring my 12 yearlong ritual of hand standing."

This artwork is currently winging its way to Queenscliff Gallery and Workshop. It was selected for the inaugural Peebles Print Prize, August 3 - September 10.

I began creating this work in October last year (2016) on the eve of the 18th anniversary of my brain injury. 18th birthdays are big, for everyone. I wanted to make something grand to recognise the time passed, and to acknowledge my skills, my survival and my suffering. I decided that it was the perfect time to hang out with greats such as Leonardo and Vitruvius. And in my little manifesto exploring the body and the Universe, written onto the copper plate, on 12 October 2016, I discovered that I have done over 20, 000 handstands! Quite an achievement.

The back to front writing is called mirror writing. It was a favoured technique of da Vinci, some say, because he considered his thoughts rather secret, and others say, because he was a left hander and it prevented the ink smudging. But it isn't really a secret. If you place my work or his, up to a mirror, it can be easily read, (or just reverse the image on a computer!). But it is important to me (and probably to da Vinci too),  that the text cannot be easily read, at least not straight away.

I am really enjoying being 18. It is still a challenging and emotionally turbulent time, maybe not unlike the experience of all other 18 year olds, but I finally feel like I am starting to grow into myself. I am growing up!

Here's a detail from this artwork.

And here is the same detail reversed so you can read some of the writing.