Fremantle Biennale Displays Works in, on, and along the Swan River
Newly commissioned works include a half-sunken ship, a wheelchair course, and Australia's first choreographed drone light show.
Andrew Sunley Smith, Overload (2021). Boat loaded with limestone. Courtesy the artist and Fremantle Biennale.
The third edition of the Fremantle Biennale opens in Western Australia from 5 to 21 November. The exhibition includes 20 site-specific commissions along the Swan River, known as Derbarl Yerrigan to the indigenous Nyoongar people, from Fremantle to Coogee Beach.
'In a time of health, social, economic, and environmental crisis, the Fremantle Biennale launches in its most ambitious format to date with a theme which encourages us to connect with one another, re-examine history, and advocate for cultural change,' said Tom Mùller, Co-Founder and Artistic Director of the Fremantle Biennale.
The exhibition's title, CROSSING 21, is taken from the destruction of a tidal sandstone land bridge that was used as a natural crossing by the Whadjuk people. The land bridge was destroyed by Irish engineer C. Y. O'Connor in 1892 to aid the growth of British settlers' Swan River colony.
Andrew Sunley Smith alludes to the event in his work Overload, pictured top. Sunley Smith will partially submerge a boat in the river using local limestone, a critique of commerce, excess, and oppression.
Situated beside the river in North Worral Park, Bruno Booth's Tightness Times Toughness offers participants an insight into his experience navigating the world in a wheelchair. The work—another kind of crossing—invites people to use a wheelchair to traverse two narrow 60 x 40-metre tunnels that follow the proportions of the Fremantle traffic bridges and the deepest channel of the river.
Another standout work is Ilona McGuire's Moombaki, a Nyoongar phrase meaning 'where the river meets the sky'. A fleet of 160 drones will reference traditional tales from the region in performances of the work over eight nights.
Several of the Biennale's works will take place on the Swan River itself. Composer Rachael Dease and sound designer Tim Collins, for instance, will present a chorus who will sing at sunset from a flotilla of couta sailboats. Couta boats are fishing vessels first designed and built in Victoria, Australia in the 19th century.
Altogether, the Biennale features works by 115 artists. Nearly all of the 36 'core artists' are Australian, with 80 percent of them from Western Australia. —[O]
