Tip:
Highlight text to annotate it
X
Nestled between the spectacular Great Barrier Reef and the Daintree Rainforest in Cairns
are pockets of creative communities battling for recognition as they struggle to make a
living from their work in a region dominated by Nature Tourism.
Of course, there are long-established creative communities in the Atherton Tablelands town
of Kuranda. But Cairns artists and collectives are trying a new way to connect with the larger
community by holding a pub-crawl with a twist.
The Cairns Creative Crawl takes tourists and locals on a tour of the city’s creative
spaces. For Books and Arts Daily Cheryl Northey went along for the ride.
It’s Friday afternoon outside the Centre of Contemporary Arts Cairns. Over 70 people
are preparing for a whirlwind tour of Cairns’ innovative and creative spaces aboard the
city’s notorious double-decker party bus.
Between tea-totalling teenagers and overseas retirees are a group of rowdy women dressed
in purple with red hats. Marie is part of that group, and with a glass of wine in her
hand, she’s ready for some fun.
“It’s fabulous. I mean where else in Cairns can you dress ridiculous like we do? You know,
with all our bling, other than the races. It’s fabulous.”
“So can I ask, is the art that you’re going to see important?”
“Oh excuse me, yes!”
Andrew Aylett usually drives the party bus around town on the Tuesday and Saturday pub-crawls.
He says the “creative crawlers” are a bit different to his usual partygoers.
“The passengers are a little less active but certainly have a good time and they can
have a look at some of the creative art spaces and things that council is doing in the area
and just a chance to ride the double-decker bus without going on a *** cruise so to
speak.”
Cairns based performance artist Brett Walsh is in charge of making sure the tour runs
smoothly.
It’s pretty tight schedule with 6 stops all up with only half an hour at each stop.
Inside the Cairns Botanic Gardens Visitors Centre, a kaleidoscopic mirrored metal building
reflecting the rainforest, is Jonathon Brilliant’s massive site-specific installation of 50,00
wooden coffer stirrers woven together like a basket.
The creative crawl heads back into Cairns, stopping at c.1907 Gallery, an old shop in the heart
of the city. It’s crammed with hundreds of tiny artworks by local artists.
It’s here I meet Rose Rigley. She’s part of Knock Knock Contemporary Artists’ Initiative
who’ve organised this SUB-150 Affordable Art Show.
The idea behind SUB-150 is the artists keep the price of their art works at $150 or less.
This includes three small works by established contemporary indigenous artist Arone Meeks.
His three vibrantly coloured prints, not much larger than postcards are an outstanding example,
says Rose.
“His works are quite expensive. It’s a wonderful opportunity for local people and
for art lovers to collect something that they may not have been able to afford in other
cases.”
The Cairns Creative Crawl started as a Cairns Festival initiative but is now held regularly
throughout the year. They’ve been ten crawls so far but it’s only the third time the
party bus has been seconded for time poor art lovers.
Rebecca Edwards, from Creative Partnerships at the Cairns Regional Council organised this
tour of Cairns’ unique and interesting creative spaces. She says they cover more than visual
arts on the tour.
“We’ve got really a mixture of things. We’ve got music, art, performance, comedy
and really, hopefully a lot of fun.”
Frank Harrision has been on previous creative crawls and enjoys being with like-minded people.
“Oh it’s such a wonderful trip around no matter what the weather is and everyone
has fun together. And you don’t have to be absolutely drunk, which is very often the
case on a Friday and Saturday night in cities.”
In it’s own way the Cairns Creative Crawl is tackling some of the challenges for artists
in region in a new way. Terri Golding-Clarke, also from Creative Partnerships, agrees.
“Cairns is a great city, but it’s a small city. The opportunities wouldn’t be the
same that maybe there in capital cities, Sydney, Melbourne, Adelaide. It can be really hard
for artists. What we don’t want to see is artists having to move out on a permanent
basis. But if we could create as much industry as we can then that is ideal for artists and
it builds that cultural tourism.”
The last stop of the night is at an on-going series called Mix Grill’d at The Arthouse
organised by Nicholas Mills, an independent producer and media artist.
It’s in the industrial area just out of town. Nicholas Mills says the events he holds
show the cultural melting pot of Cairns contemporary art.
“It’s a show designed to bring a whole bunch of art forms and cultural contexts together
in one space. It traverses DJ culture, live music, traditional musics, new media, contemporary
performance, and experimental sound and live graffiti.”
“It’s both established and emerging artists, young and old. I guess it’s the stuff that
exists in the cracks that you don’t really see at the institutions. Cairns has a much
more colourful and interesting cultural fabric than the tourism brochures will show you.”
Mills showcased local ukulele duo Bosko & Honey from Kuranda not only because of their diverse
cultural backgrounds.
“Yuki’s from Japan. Dan is Indonesian Australian from Melbourne and they sort of
smash the stereotypes of ukulele song making. Bosko & Honey play a really beautiful set
of soul, pop and even a little bit *** sort of influences to their music.”
Creative, Derryn Knuckey says Mixed Grill’d highlight the uniqueness of Cairns art.
“It reflects the Cairns scene where there is so much going on and people exploring different
mediums but bringing it all together under one hub and not really genre-fying or specialising.
It’s one of those things where it’s really exciting and builds that sense of community.”
And with regular events like the Cairns Creative Crawl and Mixed Grill’d the region’s artists
are hoping to show that besides ‘reef and rainforest’ tourism there’s also a burgeoning
contemporary art scene to savour as well.