2020? (part one) waste audit and segregation, Arts House Meat Market, Friday 23rd May 2008
Well apparently it’s illegal to skip dive anywhere and taking hard rubbish is a crime. So despite ACCA’s bulk bin not being locked up, and a hoard of VCA students diving into it well before I chose to, it wasn’t really my property to take. Having said that, the incident you’re referring to is part of a complex work and series of actions titled Work in Progress, which because of the controversy many people believe to be an important historical work. Following on from Work in Progress, I made several artworks legitimately and lawfully dealing with waste. Two of these projects were the auditing of 24 hours of waste from the Victorian College of the Arts and the interception of various samples of recyclables found in the general waste stream of Toyota’s manufacturing plant. The diversion of landfill waste was the focus of your recent 2020? installation for the 2008 Melbourne Next Wave Festival. This saw you select and organise the transport of two 23m bulk bin loads of commercial and industrial waste to the Arts House Meat Market. These materials were taken up by over 20 artists who created their own sculptures and installations. What were the challenges of realising this project and how did the artists respond to the materials?
The initial challenge was to go outside the regular avenues of arts funding to gain financial support for the project and I set out and gained support from companies and organisations in the environmental industry. Another challenge was the long hours involved, including co-ordinating volunteers and documentation surrounding the 3am waste deliveries as well as waking up at 6am on the morning following the opening to disassemble the mass installation and categorise the materials. Basically each artist or collaborative were allocated two to three days to make use of the opportunity, so the first groups to come in had an open choice of materials and space which narrowed through the week. The artists responded in varying ways and because of the scale of the space most created quite large and ambitious works in a relatively short period of time. You’ve also made public art – the mural project you installed at the now inactive Mockridge Fountain in Melbourne which showed a water source progressively drying up, Parched, is a good example. How does your approach differ when working on a specific site rather than in the gallery?
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