Nillumbik’s much-anticipated Digital Agora art projection project started lighting up townships across the shire this weekend.
The event kicked off in Eltham on Friday night and continues in Diamond Creek, St Andrews and Hurstbridge over coming weekends.
The Hurstbridge event was rescheduled to Thursday, 26 September after Nillumbik was forced to postpone the opening weekend due to the theft of projection equipment.
Digital Agora features light-based contemporary artworks that celebrates the unique characteristics of Nillumbik’s townships at night across four weekends.
It is designed to be a collective experience with each weekend featuring a different township, and different artists and artworks unique to that place.
Across the program, 16 artists explore themes related to our natural environment, personal experiences and local history to create site-specific, light-based contemporary artworks in a public space.
Nillumbik Mayor Karen Egan encouraged the community to visit one of the four townships of Eltham, Diamond Creek, St Andrews and Hurstbridge during the event.
“Digital Agora supports innovative practitioners and literally brings art out into the streets for the community to enjoy,” she said.
“Council is committed to supporting its creative community and one of our major goals is for public and participatory art to be an everyday experience for our residents,” she said.
Bianca Bowman, CEO of event partner Centre for Projection Art, said Digital Agora was about making people see familiar spaces in different ways.
“It’s about bringing contemporary art into a public space in a way people can interact with it and be invigorated,” she said.
The Eltham event is part of the Yarra Plenty Regional Library’s Booklover’s Festival. Artworks by Jane Crappsley, Pie Bolton and Kiera Brew Kurec will be positioned around Eltham Library and on the Main Rd facing wall of Platform 3095.
The Diamond Creek project will be a highlight of the Diamond Creek Town Fair. Freya Pitt has worked with five artists from Araluen’s Diamond Creek Centre to create the large-scale animated project in Elizabeth St.
In St Andrews, lead artist Yandell Walton as well as PluginHUMAN and Susan Wirth have worked to create projections in the grounds of St Andrews Hall.
Digital Agora will finish in Hurstbridge on the eve of the Grand Final public holiday (27 September) with artists Rebeccah Power, James Price, Christie Widiarto lighting up the grounds of Allwood House with their work.
Digital Agora is proudly presented by Nillumbik Shire Council with support from the Victorian State Government through Creative Victoria’s Creative Suburbs Program.
Digital Agora will be on nightly from:
- 7 – 10.30pm in Eltham from Friday 6 September to Sunday 8 September;
- Diamond Creek on Friday 13 September and Sunday 14 September;
- St Andrews from Friday 20 September to Sunday 22 September; and Hurstbridge on Thursday, September 26.
