What did you say 2022: Orange Regional Gallery
Artist Kellie O’Dempsey , Sound Mick Dick , AR Animations Helena Papageorgiou
Kellie O ’Dempsey’s What did you say?
Robertson Park, Orange NSW
Thursday 20 – Sunday 30 October 2022.
This interactive installation was a part of Orange City Council’s Future City Public Art Project.
Microscopic pores called stomata cover the surface of leaves to exchange carbon dioxide for oxygen. The word ‘stomata’ comes from the Greek word ‘stoma’ meaning ‘mouth’. What did you say? reimagines a tree’s stomata as the mouth through which the planet breathes. Viewers are asked to listen and engage in deep breathing, to be present in the moment and to connect, consider and rest. Using augmented reality, projected imagery and a soundscape of breathing, the artwork responds to our strange and ever-shifting social and environmental climate.
What did you say? is a free Future City Public Art installation funded by the NSW Government and Orange City Council.
Videographer: Madli Duff – Nomad Collective
Photography: Mitch Duff – Nomad Collective
What did you say 2022: Horizon Festival
What did you say 2022
Fri 26 Aug | 5.30–9pm
Sat 27 Aug — Sat 3 Sep | 5–9pm
Wonderland Spiegeltent, Cotton Tree Park, Maroochydore | Kabi Kabi Country
What did you say? reimagines a tree’s stomata as the mouth through which the planet breathes. The use of video and sound causes the mouth to breathe via animation and augmented reality.
What did you say? responds to the strange shifting social and environmental climate. Some mouths breathe with ease; others struggle to catch their breath; a silent few are deathly still. Viewers are asked to both listen and engage in deep and conscious breathing, to be present in the moment and to connect, consider and breathe.
What did you say? Was projected onto the trees around the gardens of The Wonderland Spiegeltent garden each night.
Creative team:
Projection: Kellie O’ Dempsey
Sound: Michael Dick (sound)
Augmented Reality: Helena Papageorgiou
What did you say?
What did you say?
7 May 2021 – 16 May 2021
Botanica - Contemporary Art Outside | City Botanic Gardens | Brisbane, QLD
On the epidermis of a tree's leaves, microscopic pores called stomata exchange carbon dioxide for oxygen. The word 'stomata' comes from the Greek word 'stoma' meaning 'mouth'. What did you say? reimagines a tree's stomata as the mouth through which the planet breathes.
Some mouths breathe with ease; others struggle to catch their breath; a silent few are deathly still. Viewers are asked to listen and engage in deep, conscious breathing, to be present in the moment and to connect, consider and rest.
Using augmented reality, projected imagery and a soundscape of breathing, the artwork responds to our strange and ever-shifting social and environmental climate.
Helena Papageorgiou (augmented reality), Michael Dick (sound).
Credit | Photography & Video: Thomas Oliver
Image Credits Horizon Festival
Wish You Were Here
Wish You Were Here
25 Jul 2021 – 29 August 2021
Redland Gallery | Cleveland, QLD
Wish You Were Here began as a response to the lockdown life of the pandemic. Uncanny household objects collide with uncertain landscapes. In search of progress, multiple figures attempt to travel yet go nowhere in this oddball world. Their figurative and abstract forms gently smash together to imitate how we fumble for connection. Wish You Were Here is an immersive installation of collaged works on paper, projected animation, sound and Augmented Reality (AR). Through repetitive rhythm and monotonous loops, non-specific locations and an unspecified time, this work blends the physical and the psychological for a moment of hypnotic but joyful reprieve. Sound by Mick Dick and AR by Helena Papageorgiou.
Credit | Photography: Louis Lim
Credit | Video: Jasmine Smith
Time Tracing
Time Tracing
Video Projection | 40 metres long
Wagga Wagga Library and Council Façade | Wagga Wagga, NSW
1 Oct - 30 Oct 2020
Kellie O’Dempsey | Sound: Mick Dick | Videographer: Damien Jenkins from Next Inline Productions | Performers: Wes Boney, Zoë Hadler, Natasha Strimpf, Markus Wright
Time Tracing recreates the map lines of the Murrumbidgee river as giant water drawings in the earth, which–over time–move, extend and connect. Working in collaboration with local Wagga Wagga artists, this large scale video work incorporates dance, movement and sound that simulate the power of the Murrumbidgee river catchment. This ancient and fragile ecosystem has held and traced story for communities throughout time; Time Tracing aims to honour the unique characteristics of the Murrumbidgee river, in all its all states; flood, drought and flow acknowledging the catchment’s significance to communities both past and present. Filmed on the banks of the river at dusk, with Indigenous and non-Indigenous emerging performers of Wagga Wagga, the video aims to celebrate the River’s connection to the land and people it supports across time as a collision of moving bodies utilise lines and repetition.
Credit | Photography: The Artist
Hardenvale
Hardenvale – our home in Absurdia
31 Oct 2020 – 31 Jan 2021
Wagga Wagga Regional Gallery | Wagga Wagga, NSW
Hardenvale – our home in Absurdia is a real-scale, immersive, house-like environment by Australian artists Catherine O'Donnell, Kellie O'Dempsey and Todd Fuller.
Through drawing, projection, built form, sound and movement, this collaborative project references the architecture of post war fibro housing as well as spaces the group describe as 'the cultural fringe of Australia'. Crossing three generations, these artists’ re-imagine lived domestic space while expanding the practice of drawing to create an intimate and unsettling experience. Harvesting images from personal narratives of imperfect moments (both familiar and strange), Hardenvale is a humble dwelling made from drawing in which to spend time. This installation invites visitors to reflect on their own experiences and memories of home.
Credits | Photographer: The Artist, Tayla Martin
Street Love
Street Love
Projection and light installation, sizes variable, Felicity Park | Caloundra, QLD
2 Oct – 4 Oct 2020 | Projections in Felicity Park
2 Oct – 30 Oct 2020 | Window light boxes over Felicity Park
Street Love celebrates community space as a place of consideration and wonder. Curator and artist, Kellie O’Dempsey, invited audiences to share in a participatory exchange through perceptual experience incorporating projection, video, sound and light installation. Street Love includes artwork by Kellie O’Dempsey, Adam Anderson, CLUNKK (Sophie Reid-Singer) and sound by Mick Dick. Together these artists explore the relationship between the physical environment, light, and colour while utilising video to create new interpretations of familiar places.
Place2Play was a creative public activation program in line with the Caloundra Public Art Plan. The project brought temporary and permanent artwork to our streets and laneways, inspiring new ways for residents and visitors to experience and rediscover Caloundra.
Links | Place2Play
Credits | Photographer: Tim Birch, The Artist
Continuum
Continuum
Exhibition: 24 Aug - 1 Sep 2019
The Old Ambo, Nambour as part of Horizon Festival | Sunshine Coast, QLD
Kellie O’Dempsey | Sound: Michael Dick | Augmented Reality: Helena Papageorgiou
Continuum brings together video, drawing and performance in an installation exploring process and possibility. These works present the ever-changing moment as line and action. Revealing drawing as transformation, using both traditional and digital means, the artist is seen drawing and un-drawing lines in a mesmerising continuum of making.
Links: Horizon Festival | Facebook
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Horizon Festival was supported by the Queensland Government through Arts Queensland
Outside the Lines
Outside the Lines
Performance: 24 May 2019 | Exhibition: 10 May - 11 Aug 2019
Museum of Brisbane as part of BAD Festival | Brisbane, QLD
Kellie O’Dempsey | Sound: Mick Dick | Performers: Saara Roppola and Maris Georgiou
Immerse yourself in a haven of colour, light and sound, as performance and installation artist Kellie O’Dempsey places audiences right in the middle of her artwork, which fuses digital drawing, performance, animated video projection and sound.
For BRISBANE ART DESIGN (BAD), Kellie teamed up with sound designer Mick Dick and performers Saara Roppola and Marisa Georgiou to perform new work and engage in discussions about their co-operative making process.
Links: Instagram | Brisbane Art and Design (BAD)
Credits | Photographer: Jono Searle
Botanica
Photographer: Cian Sanders
Botanica
10 May 2019 | Live performance
City Botanic Gardens as part of Botanica by Night | Brisbane, QLD
Curated by UAP (Urban Art Projects) Botanica 2019 was a signature event of the Museum of Brisbane's inaugural Brisbane Art Design (BAD) festival.
Creating live performance drawings from a responsive exchange between line, sound and movement Kellie O’Dempsey opened Brisbane’s annual 2019 contemporary art outside event Botanica. In drawing and animating live lines of light across the surface of the gardens, O'Dempsey simulated the energy of molecules vibrating and growing under the surface of the trees. Employing analogue and digital drawing techniques, Kellie navigated the physical space with line. The performance is the act of drawing and the experience of time that results in a mesmerising state of becoming.
Botanica exhibition is a unique, site-specific art exhibition that has been curated in a contemporary style. Set within Queensland’s heritage garden, providing a complex historical backdrop, the City Botanic Gardens acts as a living museum. Botanica was a signature event of the Museum of Brisbane's inauguralBrisbane Art Design (BAD) festival.
Links: Botanica | Brisbane Art and Design (BAD) | Instagram
Credits | Photographers: Cian Sanders / Faces of Brisbane
Negative Time Echo & The Never-ending –Line
Never End Negative Time
Screening at Adelaide Festival Centre | Adelaide, SA
Never End Negative Time brings together two video artworks, The Never-ending –Line and Negative Time Echo, in a lyrical conversation about process and possibility.
Investigating the idea that nothing is ever finished these works present the ever changing moment. Exploring drawing as transformation, using both traditional and digital means, the artist is seen drawing as the lines animate themselves in a mesmerising continuum.
Image credit | The artist
Hardenvale - our home in Absurdia
Hardenvale - our home in Absurdia
Rayner Hoff Project Space, National Art School | NSW, Australia
28 March - 20 April 2019
Kellie O’Dempsey, Catherine O’Donnell and Todd Fuller
Funded by Australia Council for the Arts, with support from Create NSW, The NSW Artists’ Grant (NAVA)
Also supported by the Parramatta Artist Studios and Bundanon Trust Artist in Residence program
Hardenvale – our home in Absurdia is a real-scale, immersive, house-like environment created by Australian artists Catherine O’Donnell, Kellie O’Dempsey and Todd Fuller. Through drawing, projection, built form, sound and movement, this collaborative project references the architecture of 1960s Western Sydney Government housing as well as spaces the group describe as ‘the cultural fringe of Australia’.
Crossing three generations, these artists’ re-imagine lived domestic space while expanding the practice of drawing to create an intimate and unsettling experience. Harvesting images from personal narratives of imperfect moments (both familiar and strange), Hardenvale is a humble dwelling made from drawing in which to spend, lose or find time. This installation invites visitors to reflect on their own experiences and memories of home.
Links | Catalogue
Credits | Images - Silversalt Photography, Peter Morgan and the National Art School // Video - Sound: Mick Dick and Cinematography: Emma Conroy
Dirt and Ash
Dirt and Ash :: Fiona Fell and Kellie O'Dempsey
20 October – 2 December 2018 | Opening Night 19 October 2018
Gallery 1: The Margaret Olley Gallery, Lismore Regional Gallery | Lismore, Australia
Kellie O’Dempsey and Fiona Fell | Sound: Mick Dick
Kellie O’Dempsey and Fiona Fell perform Dirt & Ash, an immersive multimedia installation about the relationship between the artist and work of art with Mick Dick’s (sound artist) performance on opening night.
Exhibition was opened by Dr Barbara Bolt, Professor in Contemporary Arts and Culture, Victorian College of the Arts, Faculty of Fine Arts and Music.
Dirt and Ash displays a dynamic exchange between two mid-career artists. Fiona Fell and Kellie O'Dempsey explore the links between artists’ bodies, ceramic sculpture and performance drawing and video as they inquire into the nature of each other’s creative processes. As works are built, stacked, re-formed and incorporated through performance and live drawing–the underbelly of their creative practices is exposed.
Sharing the material relationships of clay and charcoal, the shared experience of loss and survival is uncovered (in terms of life and their creative processes). Fiona Fell and Kellie O'Dempsey dramatise their perseverant search for presence, synchronising moments in the studio as performance.
Links | Catalogue // Lismore Gallery website
Exhibition Images
Performance
Videogragher: Steven Kwan
Exhibition Catalogue
Credits | Photographer: Darcy Grant // Videographer: Steven Kwan
The never-ending line
Kellie O'Dempsey: The never-ending line, NGA Play at The National Gallery of Australia, Canberra
Saturday 16 June – 28 October 2018
National Gallery of Australia | Canberra, Australia
Kellie O’Dempsey invites you into her living sketchbook, an immersive space of moving marks and dancing lines. Digital projections collide with traditional drawing in a series of dynamic and colourful experiences and creative opportunities. Contribute to the unique drawing journey as you follow the never ending line to shadow puppets, 3D drawing constructions and live animation before getting into the drawing rink for an immersive drawing experience. The never-ending line investigates drawing as a way of collaboration and transformation as it features sound elements composed by Mick Dick.
Links: NGA website
Media: SMH Article | City News Article
Exhibition
Performance
Videographer - Sixth Row
Videographer - Sixth Row
Credits | Videographer: Sixth Row
Funded by Australia Council for the Arts, with support from Create NSW, The NSW Artists’ Grant (NAVA)
Also supported by the Parramatta Artist Studios and Bundanon Trust Artist in Residence program
Ensemble
Ensemble
June 2018
Projection on William Jolly Bridge | Brisbane, Australia
For the Brisbane Classic Music Festival
Presented by BRISBANE CITY COUNCIL
Ensemble was originally created live during a performance featuring members of the Shanghai Chamber Ensemble. Describing two of the violinists, the dynamic and bold brush marks were a direct response to the virtuosity of the musicians playing. This drawing interprets the energy and flow of sound through a fluid and liquid application. It creates itself as a direct translation of drawing music in real time.
Credit | Photographer: Andrew Willis
Becoming Becoming
Becoming Becoming
13 April – 20 May 2018 | Exhibition Opening 13 April 2018
Umbrella Studio Contemporary Arts | Townsville, Australia
Kellie O’Dempsey | Sound: Mick Dick | Dancers: Dance North Felix Samson and Samantha Hines
Becoming Becoming is a dynamic site generated installation that explores the links between the human body, making and transformation through improvisation. Both a live performance and as an exhibition, this work maps processes of collaboration and aliveness through live drawing and collaboration. With Sound artist Mick Dick, Dance North dancers Felix Sampson and Sam Hines the gallery space is expanded through live performance and digital projection.
Attempting to entice all those who enter Becoming Becoming is a living collage through the flow of line, sound, colour and projection an immersive engaged environment evolves.
Links | Umbrella Studio event page // Invitation
Image credit | Photographer: Angela Little
Moving Through
Photographer: Lois Lim | Performer: Marisa Georgiou
Moving Through
Performance at Flowstate | Brisbane, Australia
Saturday 27 October & Sunday 28 October 2018
Kellie O’Dempsey | Sound: Mick Dick | Performers: Saara Rappola & Marisa Georgiou
Produced by Metro Arts and South Bank Corporation
Funded by Australia Council for the Arts
Moving Through is a spirited, site-generated image and sound performance that imagines the intermediate space between this life and the next.
Performance installation artist Kellie O’Dempsey draws on a personal tale that reveals the importance of ritual when dealing with death. Moving Through maps a guided journey of departure and brings the space to life using digital drawing and animated video projection with physical performers and sound.
Moving Through culminates in two stunning and visceral evening performances.
Links | Flowstate Event Page
Videographer: Thomas Oliver
Credit | Videographer and Photographer: Thomas Oliver
Re-Generating
Re-Generating
28 - 29 September 2018
Exhibited as part of Lit Festival, Stories in Light | Toowoomba, QLD
Kellie O’Dempsey | Sound: Michael Dick | Dancer: Ella Colborn
Playing with light, line and the live act, Re-Generating interrogates public and private spaces as shared experience.
Links: Lit Festival | Facebook | Instagram
away and towards
Photographer: Louis Lim
away and towards
Valley Metro Shopping Centre, Fortitude Valley | Brisbane, Australia
6 – 7.30pm, 5 October 2017
Kellie O’Dempsey | Sound: Michael Dick | Performers: Marisa Georgiou and Saara Rappola
away and towards is a collaborative exchange between Kellie O’Dempsey, Michael Dick, Marisa Georgiou and Saara Rappola.
This work is an evolving and fluid encounter that signifies the culmination of a research enquiry into performance drawing as a hybrid and cooperative practice.
The notion of arriving in the present is explored through the use of light, sound, movement and space.
Converging at the intersection of the live event and improvisational exchange, away and towards searches for a destination that is always here.
Performance
Photographers: Robyn Mill and Andy Willis | Videographer: Andy Willis
Resistance Movement
Resistance Movement
Kentler International Drawing Space | Brooklyn, New York
January 15 – February 19 2017
Performance + Opening Reception: Sunday, January 15, 4 – 7pm with sounds by guests
Artists’ Talk and final performance: Saturday, January 28, 4pm with musical guest M.A.N.I.A.C. Empire
Ben Gerstein: Trombone | Mike Pride: Percussion | Jonathan Moritz: Saxophone
Kellie O’Dempsey (AUS) and Jennifer Wroblewski (NJ) re-imagine the gallery as a dance hall and a gathering area where pleasure through movement is the only goal, and where the democratic practice of social dance renders all who enter equal and allied.
Resistance Movement aims to enable a shared experience. Together, artists and audience will come to witness an evolving work of light, surface and mark. Marks will be analog and digital, made on paper, and projected into the space. We will respond to music, sound, and one another. Performing a dialogue of drawing and sound in an organised and considered improvisational environment, lines and form will move on, over and through opaque and transparent surfaces. The artists will move around and with the audience, in a drawn game of call and response. Drawing as a record of human movement.
What will remain will be a mapping of performance and cultural exchange. For those present in this Gesamtkunstwerk or whole artwork, they participate in an unfolding collaboration that is both experiential and inclusive.
Resistance Movement is a 2017 rejoinder to the 1970’s Discotheque, the Cabaret/Kabarett of France and Germany prior to WWII–the rave culture of the 1990s. Underground gathering in all of its forms. Dance as protest. The dance hall as a safe haven.
Drawing is the outcome of the friction of the mark-making element on the surface. Resistance and movement are the requirements of the mark.
Links | Resistance Movement catalogue with essay by Charlotta Kotik
Performance
Performance stills
Credits | Photographer: Silvia Forni // Videographer: Gus Frias