RADICALCROSSSTITCH

Barkly Street Addition

So a couple of weeks back I was travelling past the Barkly St fence and decided to jump off the bus to check out how the wool was weathering.  And to my enourmously pleaseant surprise I discovered someone had added to it!

It’s not the best photo (I realised later) but it reads “I hear U’ stitched amongst the question marks!  And it looked gorgeous!

Massive hellos and respect to the person who did it!  Please get in touch xox

So in the weekend I headed back to get some better photos, only to discover someone had come along and cut it all off the fence.  Not in any kind of nice way either, all the wool was left lying all over the ground.  Hmpf.

So I cracked out some spray glue and stuck piles of it back to the top of the fence.  Nowhere near as pretty.  But better than it all sitting on the ground.

And still there’s no house there…

Some Interventions and an Opening

Last night saw the official launch of the Interventionist Guide to Melbourne cabinets in Platform Gallery, Flinders Subway, Melbourne.  While there is a gallery space where you can go and see work, the true work is on the street, where each artist is spending the month of October encouraging and developing new ways of doing public art in Melbourne.

I have installed four pieces of work around the streets now and planning a fair few more.  For those of you in Melbourne, put October 16-18 in your diary as the weekend where all the artists will be hitting the streets for performances, tours, installations and other creative bits and pieces.

Two of the four pieces have already been on here:

And here’s some pics of the latest couple.

You might recognise the last piece from here.

For this show us artists were asked to consider urban space: how it’s built, how we relate to it, how others relate to it.  And for me it is very much about questions of ownership, access, power and control.  My experiences of Melbourne’s CBD have been quite varied; as a worker, an activist, a resident, a mother, a pregnant woman, a public transport user, a cyclist, a pedestrian.  None of those experiences have meant much control in the space so I’ve managed to experience quite varied forms of discrimination in that space.

I’m also very aware of the access issues other people face.  Those in wheelchairs is a prime example.  It’s hard enough getting around with a pram sometimes, but even harder with a wheel chair.  You learn a whole different path of navigation around the city that able bodied people just don’t ever need to consider.  Another example is the elderly.  I do know people who live in Melbourne who haven’t visited the CBD in over a decade because it’s just too hard and intimidating.  They prefer the relative safety of the suburbs where they can get everything they need without the (media driven) fear of the city space. And there’s of course other reasons, language especially.

This all means that there is a large amount of people who are simply excluded from that space, they are invisible.

I got wondering just how many other people thought about these issues and I figured probably not too many.  Discrimination tends not to be something you think about until you experience it, and spatial experience is something that even those that experience it, aren’t necessarily aware of.  The idea that our cities and buildings are designed by and for able-bodied white guys is such a given that considerations for other needs are rarely made.

I always find department stores pretty amazing in their design.  If you stop and look at actually who uses a department store, women are by far the majority.  Yet even their designs rarely accommodate their needs.  If it’s a multi story building you will almost always find the baby wares department above or beyond ground level.  So a woman with a pram is going to need to negotiate at least one floor change to get there.  And given you aren’t supposed to use an escalator with a pram it can sometimes take longer to get to the department you want than to find the actual item you’re looking for once your there.  And that’s if you can get through the aisles.  It’s astonishing how many shops selling baby things I have been into with a pram that have aisles narrower than the average pram..

So a lot of the pieces I’m doing are talking about different peoples’ relationships with space.  And also the stuff that moves through the space.  Especially given a fair chunk of the urban space is dedicated to the peddling of stuff.

The piece above on the rubbish bin is one such piece.  Very much geared towards encouraging people to consider how easily and flippantly we throw things away.  Rather than focussing on whether you can recycle something or not, I’m more interested in people thinking about why they needed this throw away thing in the first place.  It seems that so many people still believe that the solutions to climate change and the rampant abuse of our planet are decisions to be made by politicians and CEOs.  While those people certainly have a role, the role of the consumer in changing their own behaviour is just as, if not more important.  In a country with the highest per capita emissions in the world, we really need to start thinking about why we invest so much energy in making things just to have a short, uninteresting interaction with the thing and then throw it away.  There’s got to more to life.

So these are just some of the issues that I think about when engaging with the urban fabric.  And I am sure these are completely different to the issues the other artists consider.  I urge you to visit the website and visit the gallery and check them all out.

And most importantly, I urge you to grab a map from the gallery and get out into the city and consider your own relationships with the spaces within and what opportunities you see for artistic practice and engagement.  Then head back to the gallery and share your ideas with the rest of us!

And now for some pics of the opening.  Thanks to all who came it was a great night!

Thinking about street art

The upcoming Interventionist Guide to Melbourne show has given me plenty of time to think about the role artists play in our society and how much art is constrained by our economic system.

Any artist that spends more than five minutes thinking about the world around them will be aware of the effect gentrification has on their lives.  But it seems very few really understand how it works.  I see far too much art around me – especially street art – that plays into the hands of the gentrifiers.

I was gonna write a big rant on this but instead I URGE you to download and listen to this episode from the Renegade Economists instead.  It sums up so brilliantly the economics behind why artsists are just pawns in the speculators profit game.

What really frustrates me is when I see really brilliant creative minds who go cap in hand to the land lords asking for good deals on rent for creative spaces when really it should be the other way around.  Especially if you think about how much value artists contribute to communities.  Or arguably even worse is when artists set themselves the task of ‘prettying up’ a decaying suburb.  Rather than questioning why there’s row after row of boarded up shops, they just go and paint pictures on them.  The owners freakin love it, I assure you.

There are countless examples of how artists move into a run down area, get cheap rent, make the place awesome and desirable and then get priced out of the area when the speculators cash in on their efforts.

The question I have to ask is, as artists when are we going to educate ourselves on these issues and collectively stand up against it?

Rent is one of the reasons we started the Craft Cartel.  We wanted to create a market space for crafters who were doing truly interesting things.  It was apparent to us that so many crafters were making stuff that was palatable for the retail sphere not out of desire but out of need.  There’s no point making stuff unless you know for sure someone is going to buy it, especially if your craft is a major source of income.  And if you want to sell your stuff in shops the pressure is even greater as the shop owners have such massive overheads.  Especially rent.

So we made a real concerted effort to have super low stall fees at our markets because we wanted people to be able to have a space to bring the really crazy stuff.  The political stuff, the kooky stuff and the stuff that really makes you squirm..

It’s very much a labour of love for us.  The stall fees went to covering the costs of the market but didn’t go near covering our costs to organise and promote.  But the payment was in the fantastic community that arose out of it.  We had sellers say to us that they loved coming to our markets, not to make money but to have a great time!  So as far as we were concerned, it was a raving success.

So it really gets me going when I know that crafters are busting their asses to make sustainable, interesting, awesome things and there’s so many people out there sitting around trying to figure out how to make money off them.  Be it stupidly expensive markets, yet another bloody internet marketplace or (what really makes my skin crawl) advertising space – we even rip each other off!

It is the monopoly capitalist system that makes it so hard for makers.  Yet it’s so rare that we sit down AS MAKERS and use our creative skills to come up with new ways of doing things.

But sometimes people do. And I want to pay massive respects to those people.

If you want some inspiration or some more info I recommend you check out some of these resources:

• Community Land Trusts – a bloody good working example of reformed local economics
• I Want To Live Here – Born to Rent – win $3000 by making a short film about gentrification. And there’s some good writing about gentrification on that site. Especially check out the blog.
• The Antagonist Movement – just discovered this NY crew and LOVE!  Actually gives me a reason to want to visit that fine city..  What really pressed my buttons was this short doco I found on Wooster Collective. It’s brilliant.  Watch.

The Antagonist Art Movement – For Dummies from Anthony Ferraro on Vimeo.

MRCC gets more press!

The latest Melbourne Revolutionary Craft Circle action already got in the local paper. And to add to that I did an interview on 3CR’s fabulously awesome DIY Arts Show – which you can listen to online now.

AND today a story has appeared in The Vine about it.

Yay!

RCS in the paper

After the latest action by the Melbourne Revolutionary Craft Circle in Footscray, one of the local papers, The Star, wrote a story about it. Including a lovely bad ass guerilla crafter pic!

What the…

Readers of Radical Cross Stitch will remember last year when the Melbourne Revolutionary Craft Circle got out in Footscray and stitched ‘I Wanna Live Here’ on the fence on the corner of Barkly St and Commercial Road.  Here’s the award-winning short film by Anna Brownfield as a refresher

So almost a year on and some philistine (guessing the landlord..) cut it off!  Clearly not happy with the community questioning the ongoing waste of such a precious resource the local landmark was destroyed.

The MRCC was clearly not going to let this go unresponded to.  So a few days later we were out again, this time armed with bright green wool and tummies filled with Pho.

What the hell is going on?
Why is this block still empty?
Why are there 11 other vacant sites around the primary school?
Why does the State Government continue to believe the outright lies of the property industry that the housing crisis is driven by lack of land?
Why do we still allow this waste of our most precious resource when there’s over 100,000 people every night in Australia with no place to live, let alone call home?

We’ve had enough.

Green Renters

Anyone who’s ever rented a place will know how hard it is to get your landlord to fix something when it’s broken.  Unless you have a dream landlord – or your landlord lives with you – it can take bloody ages.

I remember living in a flat at university which was owned by a lecturer and managed by her daughter.  They were pretty good landlords but were right into spending as little as possible on the place.  That meant the daughters husband was made to do any alterations on their houses.  He was a lovely bloke but not really that competent.

One day we were told that they were going to fix up our (centuries old) side footpath.  This was great – we thought – until the work fixing the footpath broke the (centuries old) sewerage pipes under the footpath.  Needless to say we went without a loo for far too long for a house of four twenty something women, and the place stunk for weeks!

Everyone has a story like this.  It does seem so much easier to own your own place.  But with housing affordability at its worst point since WW1 in Australia for far too many owning is just way out of the question.  (And for those of you considering buying? Don’t. Read this.)

So for those of you out there in rentland who are conscious of the fact we live on a finite planet and are looking for ways to reduce your house’s impact on the earth, there is a brilliant new site for you!

Green Renters is “a blog for those who rent but still strive to lead an ecologically and environmentally sound existence”.  The site is chocka full of tips on how to increase the efficiency of your home life without major renovations and also good strategies for convincing your landlord that the major sustainable renovations are a good idea.

Did you know that the home insulation rebate is turning into a properly funded thing on July 1?  That means that people on lower incomes can get their home insulated for free from July 1.  The grant is only for owner-occupiers but there’s a few people I know that live with their landlord, so if that’s you, make sure your lord sees this!

Green Renters is a super resource and I recommend you all take a look.  Even if you do own your own home there’s a ton of good resources on how to do things cheaper and better for our lovely earth.

Hooray!

Badgeriffic

I’m getting super excited counting down to this years’ Melbourne Social Forum, which is on in just TWO WEEKS!  If you’re never been to a social forum before, it’s kind of like a global economic summit but without the white guys in suits, massive military presence and counter-productive outcomes.  The social forum movement arose as an alternative to the globalisation wave that was sweeping the planet at the end of the last millennium, based around the idea that ‘another world is possible’.

At social forums, grassroots activists who work in the fields of social, economic and environmental justice get together and update each other on campaigns, talk about their work and share skills and resources.

This Melbourne Social Forum there’s gonna be a pretty decent craft presence as the movement is really coming to grips with the idea that a big part of sustainability is making more of the things we use in our lives.  The Craft Cartel is doing a workshop (details to come) about craftivism and some of the issues around the consumerisation of craft.

And of course, there’s gonna be a market at the social forum!  There’s going to be heaps of different organisations with stalls so you can learn about all the campaigns going on and find out what you can do to support them.  And there’s going to be a heap of local, handmade stuff on stalls.  I borrowed a badge maker to make some more stuff to go on my stall and spent yesterday happily making mixed media badges.  There’s some at the top of the post.  Like?  You better come to the Melbourne Social Forum!

Craft Cartel Podcast Episode 9: Faythe Levine

Hooray it’s Episode #9 of the Craft Cartel podcast, and we talk to Faythe Levine about her brand new documentary film “Handmade Nation”

by Sublime Stitching.

Rayna has a great chat with Faythe about the film, making zines, the GFC, and yes, Paris Hilton comes up again!  Check out the Handmade Nation website and blog and Flickr site to see pics of the Aussie tour and of course, the Paris Hilton pics. A MASSIVE big thanks to the awesome people at in.cube8r Gallery in Smith Street for helping to make this interview happen!

The track off the podcast is Craft Talk by Leslie Hall.  It’s Craft-tastic! Check the video:

Next up we bring back the zine review section and review:

The Thrity Crafter from Apartment Cat
Sharp and Pointy – a craft zine by mir UPDATE – you can buy it here!
Outdoor Knit: the graffiti knit kit from Outdoor Knit

And a bit of an update on the Craft Cartel. Check out the Fashion Jam pics here, read about Trash Bag Rehab here, and the Melbourne Social Forum here, and the City Press workshop here!

Phew!

And as always we’d love to hear from you, comment below or drop us a line. And don’t forget to check out the archive if you’re new round here.

The best way to listen to the podcast is to subscribe and download today!

If that doesn’t work  you can download the file directly from here.

We really don’t like advertising very much round these parts, so if you like what you hear, please make a donation to help support future episodes. It’s what an add-free world sounds like.

Media whores!

Since craft is totally the new black and recession chic is all the rage, everywhere you turn these days there seems to be a story about craft and how it’s practitioners are saving the world.

And we’ve been in some of them, yay!

Here’s an article that was in the Sunday magazine in last weekend’s Herald Sun, I think it was in the Daily Telegraph(?) equivalent in Sydney.

Click on the images to see them big.

Radical craft wins!  And Brendan who wrote the story is a top crafty bloke too.  He makes jam!  mmm jam…  And is was great having a big chat with him!

Casey and I were also on the sunday artsy program on 774ABC Radio in Melbourne just before I buggered off on my overseas jaunt.  It’s quite the funny interview.  I recommend a nice cup of tea and a 10 minute sit down while you have a listen (click to play or ctrl+click/right click to save).

Bring on the global craft takeover.