GALLERY 1 + 2

SafARI 2008

Mark Brown, Timothy Kendall Edser, Lucas Grogan, Luke Thurgate curated by Lisa Corsi

What the Fringe Festival is to Edinburgh and Liste is to Basel, SafARI 2008 will be to Sydney during the 2008 Biennale of Sydney. SafARI is an exhibition presenting works by emerging and unrepresented Australian artists across three Artist Run Initiatives in Sydney (China Heights, MOP Projects and Gaffa). SafARI will include works in diverse media including photography, new media, ceramics and painting. SafARI will be timed to coincide with the first three crucial weeks of the 2008 Biennale of Sydney (13 June ñ 29 June 2008). This unofficial and unauthorised linkage, (made by the timing of the exhibition only), capitalises on the increased national and international focus on Sydney at that time in order to provide opportunities for all the artists, arts workers and art spaces involved.

- Talk by Barbara Flynn at Gaffa: Sunday 22nd June at 3pm
- Walking tour to all venues/Artist Talks: Saturday 28th June at 2pm
- Closing party at China Heights: (following Walking Tour) Saturday 28th June at 6pm

MOP Projects and SafARI are supported by the Visual Arts and Craft Strategy, an initiative of the Australian, State and Territory Governments. SafARI is also grateful for the support of the City of Sydney, Avant Card, Little Creatures and Playbill Printworks.


Luke Thurgate


Luke Thurgate


Mark Brown


Mark Brown


Lucas Grogan


Lucas Grogan


Timothy Kendall Edser

AN INDEX FOR THE HOMELESS for Abercrombie Street JUNE 2008
There are many blind spots in cities that allow shelter spaces for homeless people. But the profit motive has little mercy for the disadvantaged. As the nature of public verses private space is contested, the outcast provide the shock troops. The Shiny, Tidy New City has little room for those who live outside. As public space is privatised or commercialised, spatial courtesies are engineered to be more and more hostile. Councils can make matters worse for the Homeless in tiny ways. Planners design to lock out the poor and less-mobile: benches have arm-rests in the centre and toilets have door timers or are permanently locked. Churches, too, are closing drop-in centres and soup kitchens.

This project is part of a series called An Index of Kindness. The street intervention directly on busy Abercrombie Street aims to remind citizens of Sydney that social inclusion is very important not just for homeless people. The work illuminates the plight of the Homeless in a poetic/political agit-prop. The language of the poetic/political I hope will engage people in a form of propaganda I’ve named Socio-Obligato. It seeks to personalise and empower the Homeless by providing greater recognition of the homeless as individuals and of their civil rights.

image above: Ruark Lewis, An Index For The Homeless, 2008

Commissioned as an out-of-gallery project by the National Trust of Australia(NSW), and funded by the Australia Council & Sydney City Council