Born in October 2005, Mode is dedicated to exploring museums, design and everything in between. The site is run by Lisa, currently working in the areas of Community Cultural Development and Indigenous arts.
Grab yourself a skinny decaf soy latte and make yourself at home!
Email Mode at mode[at]optusnet.com.au
Experimenting with ideas about the way in which they see themselves and how others perceive them, Crooked Rib are a group of young, Muslim women who are creating artworks in collaboration with a professional visual artist.
An exhibition will open in October 2008, but in the meantime, for updates from the participants check out the Crooked Rib Blog.
The group have been exploring mediums from street art, to Islamic calligraphy to photography. It has been a real privilege and inspiration to work with this group and every week I look forward to seeing how the project evolves.
Support the Crooked Rib project by dropping by and leaving a comment!
Here are some links to sites that are inspiring me work-wise at the moment. The first is AerosolArabic: Urban Islamic Art, the site of Mohammed Ali, an Islamic graffiti artist in the UK. According to the website, Mohammed ‘takes his inspiration from the modern urban-art of graffiti and weaves it together with the grace and eloquence of Islamic Arabic calligraphy’. You can view clips about his work and workshops with youth on You Tube.
Another site which I keep checking in on at the moment is Beyond the CCTV: Melbourne City Street Art Project. This is the blog for a project that some of my colleagues are working on and is updated by the artists working on the City of Melbourne’s Graffiti Mentoring Pilot Project. Check out Union Lane if you are in Melbourne to see how it evolves.
CMYI (Centre for Multicultural Youth Issues) is coordinating the Multicultural Youth Pledge a campaign ‘working to set the record straight, get some balance into the discussion, counter myths and provide information about the situation of migrant and refugee young people’.
The Making Links conference is coming to Melbourne next year. You can also access some of the presentations at the website from this year’s conference.
Social Design Notes – an inspiring blog full of links and opinions on projects that aim to make a difference
Good Magazine – billed as ‘media for people who give a damn’. As well as the hard-copy magazine, Good is available online on its website as well as through its videos on Youtube.
Inspired by the thought ‘Who designs your life?’ Dott07 consists of a number of intriguing projects that involve the community and raise awareness about issues relevant to the North East England region. Follow the latest on their blog. (via Social Design Notes )
New York’s Cooper Hewitt National Design Museum has recently opened the exhibition ‘Design for the Other 90% ’ exploring 30 humanitarian design projects. View the exhibition’s blog here.
Projects of interest – Homeless signs , by Graphic Design Student Mark Daye (Via Social Design Notes) Sean Godsell shelters for homeless people Shelter in a Cart – Design Boom Social Awareness Award 2006 ’A not-for-profit design competition exploring homelessness’
Meetings aren't always much fun, but today we had a meeting at the Arts House Meat Market followed by a short performance by Trace Elements, who practice Parkour and Parkour-inspired movement.
The Meat Markets is an incubator space for artists to use to develop new works, as well as housing community arts organisations.It's a beautiful old space and it was awesome to see the Parkour guys swinging between what I'm guessing were the old hooks to hang up meat.
Rather than try and describe parkour myself, watch the video above. There's also a longer one on Youtube showing Trace Elements in and around Melbourne featuring some death-defying leaps from buildings amongst other moves - arghh!
In the Age today, there’s a lovely, feel–good story about a council building a wood-fire pizza oven in the local park. Originally the idea of Narelle Vogel, the Albury City Council’s Cultural Development Officer, the oven opened last October, and appears to have been a great success.
So far, the wood-fired oven has been used at a number of community events. Money raised from selling the food at an outdoor screening of Kenny on Australia Day has been put towards food education classes where kids learned to cook their own pizzas and bread.
Feasting on food in the great outdoors has, not only had benefits for the stomach, but, has brought people together where 'Neighbours and strangers sit together and talk about the food they are cooking, their family and other community matters'.
Dripping with sarcasm, the letter stated ‘Our intention is to locate a close relative of Mr. Dixon’s and apply for the body to be exhumed so that we can organize DNA testing for a variety of scientific and other reasons’.
To which the Natural History Museum replied:
‘I’m afraid I don’t think I’m going to be able to help you on this one. The Museum doesn’t actually hold records on the location of deceased kin of members of staff, and individual arrangements for organ donation are ultimately a personal matter’
As odd or even funny as these letters may seem, the issue is a very serious one. As the article in the NIT explains, the Natural History Museum is repatriating seventeen Tasmanian Indigenous people, but are conducting invasive scientific tests, before returning the remains.
The case has been taken to the British High Court by the Tasmanian Aboriginal Centre. According to this more recent article the case has been ‘adjourned pending mediation’.
To me, this is a matter of respect. Of course museums must conduct research, but not at the expense of the communities they serve.
Yes, I've finally updated my about mode section which explains why things have been a bit quiet on Mode lately.
No longer in a museum, I have been given a great opportunity to work for the next two years as a Graduate. This year, I’m working in Community Cultural Development and Indigenous Arts.
It’s a shift from objects to people, a move I’m really happy with - evident by the fact that I actually look forward to going to work - even on a Monday!
What does this mean for Mode? There may be less on this site about museums and design :(, but more about Community Cultural Development and Indigenous arts :). I see this as a positive change, because there’s no doubt in my mind that many museums could enhance their own connections with communities, both indigenous and non-indigenous.
I’ve also been asked to keep a reflective log, so just a warning that over the coming months, this will take the form of a reflective (b)log. Although I’ll leave out the juicy bits (names and specifics), it will hopefully still be an interesting read.
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