All the way from New York and New Mexico, Australian artist Sara Morawetz has been mapping Kyneton using geo-mapping software and technical data.
Unable to visit as intended for her research, thanks to the pandemic, the artist put her mind to understanding the town from afar, with the tools available to her at a distance.
The result is The Centre of Everything (2022) – three professionally manufactured street signs positioned at the centre, the anti-centre and the edge of Kyneton, based on geographical and population data drawn from the Australian Bureau of Statistics.
“For something to have a centre, it must have an edge,” Morawetz says.
“The centre is the point upon which the weight of the town is balanced; the edge is a random position taken along the town’s perimeter – representative of the last point one encounters when crossing into, or out of, Kyneton.”
For Kyneton Contemporary, with 11 artists exhibiting projects like this, the town-wide exhibition is a wonderful opportunity to explore the quality and character of a regional town and its broader regional setting.
Artists have researched, connected with locals, and taken into consideration the community and the environment of the area.
The resulting work makes for fascinating insight and a celebration of so many things we might take for granted or not even know exists.
“Sara’s artwork is a particularly interesting way to understand how our town is ‘read’ both from an outsider’s point of view and from the point of view of technical information like town planning, population distribution and geography,” Kyneton Contemporary’s Clare Needham says.
With 10 other projects across the town, at venues like the Kyneton Mechanics Institute, the Botanic Gardens, Scout Hall, Freemasons Hall and Watts Pavilion at the showgrounds, the Kyneton Contemporary Art Triennial offers a smorgasbord of interesting art and interesting insights into the history, the environment and the communities of regional Victoria.
Artists from Western Australia, New South Wales, Queensland, New Mexico and Melbourne, join local artists Ravi Avasti and Adam Lee for this multi-site exhibition across the town of Kyneton.
See the website www.kynetoncontemporary.com for more information and to purchase your ticket now. Children are free, concessions available.
