What does it mean to choose a creative life today? Three artists come together for an honest discussion about the inspiration, sense of fulfilment and challenges that come with the choice to prioritise creativity.
Set within the Art Museum and surrounded by Rosalie Gascoigne’s bold artworks, multidisciplinary artist Liam Benson, floral artist and designer Azzmin Frances, and composer-performer Leah Blankendaal come together to reflect on what it means to live creatively.
Like Rosalie Gascoigne, who discovered her creative potential after studying Ikebana and then expanded that practice into sculpture and assemblage later in life, creativity ignites everything we do. So, how do we harness this potential in our lives and creative work?
Chaired by Bundanon Curator Boe-Lin Bastian, this conversation highlights the personal and collaborative dimensions of making art, and examines the many forms creative practice can take.
Cost
Adult $18
Member Free
Concession / Youth $12
Family $40
Bundle & Save
2 events 10% off3 events 15% off
4+ events 20% off
Location
Bundanon Art Museum
170 Riversdale Road
Illaroo NSW 2540
Featuring
Liam Benson lives and works on Dharug land in Western Sydney and has been making art for over two decades. With a multidisciplinary practice encompassing performance, photography, video and textiles, Benson’s works emerge from ongoing conversations about how culture, subculture and identity interrelate and evolve. Social perceptions of gender, race, culture, sexuality and identity are deconstructed and re-assembled through performative narratives that reveal critical space for personal and cultural awareness and reflection. Benson’s practice is centred around working collaboratively with diverse communities to create a sense of belonging and connectivity.
Leah Blankendaal is an award-winning musician whose language is “kind, immersive and thoughtful,” and offers “us space to breathe and to be.” At home as a composer and performer, Blankendaal’s composition spans orchestral, chamber and vocal music, as well as electro-acoustic improvisation and installation art. Composition collaborators include Quince Ensemble (USA), Duo Alterity (USA), Rubiks Collective (VIC), Luminescence Chamber Singers (ACT), Soundstream (SA) and Tura New Music and STRUT Dance (WA). Blankendaal’s performance practice for flute and loop pedal has been critically celebrated for “gracefully summoning you into its realm with its beautiful harmonic suspensions and resolutions”. Her work has toured Europe, Southeast Asia, USA and New Zealand.
Azzmin Frances is the founder of Braer Studio, a multidisciplinary creative studio that merges floral artistry with contemporary design. Braer celebrates beauty in the unexpected. The way they arrange flowers is an extension of how they view the world around them, with deep reverence for the natural world. Braer practices a style of Ikebana called Sogetsu Ikebana. The Sogetsu school of Ikebana was founded in 1927 by Sōfū Teshigahara, who recognised Ikebana as a creative art that anyone can practice, using any material.
Make Good Festival is proudly supported by the NSW Government through its tourism and major events agency, Destination NSW.
