Eighty artworks by eight Australian artists have been buried under 120 tonnes of dirt inside Carriageworks in Sydney as part of Heap, the centrepiece of the Festival of Dangerous Ideas (Fodi). Visitors will be invited to dig up the works this weekend, with each piece representing a "dangerous idea" — something "that has potential to change the world if taken seriously," according to festival director Danielle Harvey.
Artworks Buried Under Tonnes of Earth
During the installation process, a Hitachi earthmover buried a suitcase, a bronze mushroom, a canister of kangaroo apple, and a spider costume under the mound of dirt. Already interred were a human figure cast in hardened dirt and a funerary urn. The artworks were progressively added to a nearby display after being unearthed, as diggers are required to relinquish any treasure they find.
Heap draws on a "very obvious metaphor," Harvey conceded, but a powerful one. "We're a country built on mining and excavating, so what we find in the dirt and the lens that we [put on it] — whether it's interesting or dangerous, and how we value it — is super interesting in an Australian context."
Artists Tackle Labour, Colonisation, and Mortality
Sophie Penkethman-Young's contribution involved 25 tiles bearing the text of a labour agreement between herself and the 3D printer she used to make them. The artist limited the printer's use to a standard work week of 38 hours, capping output at one tile per day. "What would it mean if I really stood by my ethics? This is the silliest take I could do," she said.
Wiradjuri artist Brook Andrew's work featured a series of canisters containing medicinal and edible plants native to the Americas, the Middle East, and Australia, each accompanied by an explanatory note. Andrew worked with botanical specialists and Indigenous medicine people to source specimens and stories, including Lebanese wild thyme (za'atar), Australia's murnong (yam daisy), and several types of hallucinogenic Brugmansia (angel's trumpet), used for healing and spiritual practices in Colombia. "Opening ourselves up to knowledge systems that are thousands of years old" is inherently dangerous in this highly pharmaceuticalised era, Andrew said.
Reimagining National Symbols and Personal Fragments
Aretha Brown, working with members of her queer women's collective Kiss My Art, reimagined the Australian flag through a queer, Gumbaynggirr lens. The resulting quilt was sealed in a suitcase before burial. "I don't think [the Australian] flag properly represents us — and I think it's actually divisive," Brown said. "What could a new Australian flag look like? And how do you go about changing it? Is it something that happens after we become a republic? Is it something that happens when we change Australia Day? I think these are pretty dangerous ideas."
Tim Silver's human figure cast in hardened dirt was a statement on emotional distress and withdrawal, while Tarryn Gill's urn, made from gold fabric and bearing the multiple faces of Janus, the Roman god of thresholds, was a statement on mortality and mutability. Gill was inspired by Freud's theory of the self as a collection of fragments we unearth over time and by the recent death of her cat, for whom she made an urn. "I wanted to make something similarly reverent, but my own funerary ornament," she said. "I've been thinking about what Jung says about middle age: you've spent all this time building achievements and staking your claim on the world, and then … [you realise] that's not really what life's about. What do I do with the time I have left? Time is actually what is dangerous."
Heap is open at Carriageworks, Sydney on 22 and 23 August, as part of the Festival of Dangerous Ideas, which runs until 30 August.
