Georgia is a visual arts student who sculpts, paints and writes. Her artistic creations are inspired by nature, music, family, teachers, peers and social interactions.
Being a multi-media artist allows me to express ideas and concepts via a written and visual language. Writing and artmaking help me process my innermost thoughts and questions about the world around me. My dreams also stimulate my creative practice. I regularly write about my dreams and thoughts, often in the form of poems. I write poetry, not necessarily for poetry’s sake, but as a method of producing and deducing – for figuring things out. Interestingly, I often find answers to questions I didn’t intentionally set out to ask.
Being a part of tbC has not only changed the way I approach my art, it has given me the opportunity to make, present and sell my work. This has, in turn, given me a greater sense of what my creativity is worth.
There is also a strong sense of community at tbC. Collective practice has helped me connect to other artists and the wider community. As a result, I have met and stayed in contact with a varied group of friends and collaborators. Creating with and alongside other creative minds shifts my way of thinking and the way in which I work. At tbC, artists feed off each other creatively, producing something much more than just a product. I love being associated with such a powerful group of creative thinkers. I feel like I have become a fuller artist and person because of it.
The Art of Conversation (Digital) is an interactive artwork that engages the general public in creative conversations. On scanning the artwork (with a free app on an iPhone or iPad), a QUESTION appears. Participants type an ANSWER, to which they receive a RESPONSE. Answers are automatically fed into the back end of the app and become part of the work. The interface continually generates questions engaging participants in ongoing conversations.
Conversation starters come from tbC’s studio dialogue, social interactions and group art projects and are centred around how a collaborative arts practice supports young artists. The Art of Conversation (Digital) is inspired by tbC’s Random Methodologies project, Chalk Talk practice and the work of seventeen-year-olds Kate ten Buuren and Charisse Walton.
The Art of Conversation (Digital) was exhibited at fortyfivedownstairs gallery in Flinders Lane, Melbourne, in 2017. It was selected for the 2017 Melbourne and Sydney Fringe Festivals. It was part of The International Stencil Art Prize and features in the Prize’s 10th Anniversary Book, published in 2020. An earlier iteration using QR code technology was selected for the 2013 (e)merge Art Award in Washington DC.
Download tbC’s The Art of Conversation app from the App Store and try it out!
Callum mainly works with pastels and oil paint but also sculpts.
My artworks celebrate the unusual characters I encounter every day. They express my curiosity about the human condition, especially the quirky and eccentric among us.
The stories behind Callum's subjects are as interesting as the works themselves. For example, the first work presented here is a portrait of a man Callum saw in a YouTube video at a Minecraft convention. He was suggesting in the sweetest and meekest way that the Minecraft creators consider adding ‘birds that sing at dawn’ to the program. The YouTube clip is a bit of a mocking compilation of him asking for this. It was the man's genuine sweetness that inspired me to paint this enigmatic portrait as a tribute to counter the YouTube parody of him. And guess what? Minecraft has since added singing birds to the program!
Callum has just completed an Advanced Diploma of Visual Art and wants to teach. He wants to help other young people experience the joy of creative practice and help them discover how powerful creative expression can be as a communication tool.
I see tbC as more than a building or a project. I have seen it grow and connect people. tbC is exactly what young artists need, an opportunity to be trusted and treated as creative equals and a stepping stone into the wider artworld.
tbC artists make and present artwork together. Collaborative and joint authorship practices prioritise the work young tbC artists make ahead of their emerging identities. This practice liberates young artists from the constraints of their biographies and advances earlier artistic agency and status. While the identities of tbC’s young artists emerge over time, a positive reception continues.
tbC artists make and present collaborative and jointly authored artworks that focus on the visual, public, digital and publishing arts. Artistic processes and outcomes develop from catalyst moments in the studio and via the many social, cultural and informal learning experiences resulting from group practice.
Young artists at tbC often claim they have more success in building artistic agency and status as a group than when practicing alone, arguing that the group dynamic offers them a power base they can’t find in solo practice.
Together, tbC artists are building earlier artistic agency and status.
tbC is an artist-run initiative based in the community. Like traditional community art practices, it is socially accessible and welcoming. However, what distinguishes tbC from other examples is the group’s primary focus on dedicated arts practice and the development of creative careers.
Young members of tbC often complain that community arts programming disproportionately focuses on their at-risk status and their educational, health and welfare needs, as opposed to their artistic needs and talent. tbC experiments with publishing, public, digital and exhibition practices via a collaborative arts model that focuses on making and presenting art. This dedicated arts model engages young creatives in sophisticated artistic practices that result in earlier artistic agency and status and earlier artworld engagement.
tbC’s model still produces positive community, informal learning and health and wellbeing outcomes as it naturally builds confidence, self-worth and meaning. However, this is not tbC’s primary goal. Artistic practice and presentation are the primary goals of tbC’s practice.
Kyle is a street artist and a regular member of Belgrave’s Blacksmiths Way Graffiti and Street Art Project. He also paints at a range of other sites all over Melbourne. Kyle is becoming well known for his provocative and witty stencil artworks.
I love to illustrate crazy characters, inspired mainly by Disney movies. I am influenced creatively by the artist Nychos and the way he re-presents well-known people, characters and animals in his own style. I like the concept of taking someone else’s image or idea and recreating something of my own as a spinoff of the original. The way I work is that I start with a sketch. I then make A0 prints of that sketch, usually 4-5, making up a multi-layered stencil. I number each layer and, with a scalpel, cut out different sections. I then spray each layer in different aerosol colours until I build up a detailed image, usually on a public wall. It’s a very time-consuming creative process, but the results are always exciting.
I recently participated in The Hall & Wilcox Art Exhibition and Acquisition Program (Melbourne) and sold my first artwork. The experience and reaction to my work were amazing, and I’d love to exhibit like this more often.
I like how at tbC, you are never alone. Working with other artists gives me different ideas, which can only be triggered by a group environment. Working with like-minded people and the back and forth of idea-sharing means I am always learning new ways of thinking and working.
Rohan is a graffiti and street artist.
Street Art is my passion, although I also love to draw on paper. I particularly like patterns and am drawn to geometric designs. I am currently designing a graffiti-style typeface.
A few years ago, I found myself in real trouble and on the path towards a criminal record for graffiti. I believe that working collectively with other young artists has channelled my creative needs and aspirations in a more positive way. Being part of an artistic community has given me some exciting opportunities. I love that I don’t have to work and create alone. I wish there were more studios like tbC. There are so many sporting clubs and recreational opportunities within our communities, so many parks and outdoor facilities. I just wish there were more art studios.
I recently participated in a city-based street art exhibition, The Hall & Wilcox Art Exhibition and Acquisition Program (Melbourne) and sold my first work. Presenting work in a gallery was a new and exciting experience for me.
Rohan has been helping to manage The Blacksmiths Way Graffiti and Street Art Project in Belgrave for several years now – a project that engages a growing group of young graffers and taggers in graffiti and street artworks.
tbC’s arts model is distinguished by a dedicated and contemporary art focus. Artmaking is the central activity. This differs from traditional community art practices, youth development models and formal arts education, where social outcomes or the meeting of educational and wellbeing targets primarily shape activity.
tbC believes that a dedicated youth arts practice leads to earlier artistic agency and status. Members engage with tbC for extended periods, positioning themselves as practicing artists, launching artistic careers.
Click the final eight images to play videos.
Hoodie Mag is an arts publishing project. It is an Australian production but also engages with and presents international artists and activists.
The magazine represents young artists who are challenging cultural and artworld stereotypes. The title of the mag reflects this rebellious nature. The hoodie (slang for hooded sweatshirt) is often worn by and associated with young people. This association is not always a positive one. Using the name in this provocative but positive way helps reframe its negative implications.
The inaugural edition of Hoodie Mag was shortlisted in the 60th Annual Australian Publisher Association’s Book Design Awards for Best Designed Specialist Illustrated Book 2012. It also received a finalist nomination for the Best New Publication For and By Young People Under 30 in the Express Media Literary Book Awards in December 2011.
Click the first two images to play videos.
Filming by: tbC’s young film partner, Joel Sharpe.
Logo design by: tbC’s young motion graphics designer, David Curtis.
Front image of Hoodie Mag artists by: Nigel Clements, media reporter
Hoodie Mag
Read the Hoodie Mag case study
tbC is a youth-driven, adult and peer mentored artist-run initiative. While the focus at tbC is primarily on artistic practice and presentation, social engagement and informal learning flourishes. tbC members are attracted to this informal learning environment, which is strikingly different to formal classroom and teacher/student models. There is no predetermined structure or curriculum at tbC, and young member artists are encouraged to drive creative practices and outcomes. This means the model is responsive to ever-changing group dynamics, membership and creative interests. The relaxed and socially welcoming space of the studio makes this informal learning environment even more attractive.
Despite the differences in age, experience and expertise of tbC members, an unusually non-hierarchical power structure has developed. Young member artists naturally take on peer mentoring roles and actively shape the conceptual direction of tbC and its creative outcomes. Members mainly attribute this non-hierarchical power structure to the project being initiated by a group of young artists with a clear artistic vision and a desire to pursue creative pathways, as well as a desire to challenge artworld stereotypes associated with the status of youth arts.
You can read more about tbC’s founding artistic vision here.
Click the final image to play video.
tbC has developed a handful of legal graffiti and street art precincts in and around Belgrave, east of Melbourne. Member artists paint walls along local bike paths, train stations and skate parks. Young tbC artists lead these projects in partnership with local councils, parks and transport departments, as well as traders and township groups. The scale and notoriety of these projects have delivered young tbC artists significant artistic agency and status.
tbC’s signature graffiti and street art project, The Blacksmiths Way Graffiti and Street Art Project, began in 2015 and is located in Belgrave. Blacksmiths Way is a 400m laneway running alongside the train line in Belgrave. A long row of shops back onto this laneway. tbC’s studio was, for many years, located on this laneway. The Blacksmiths Way Graffiti and Street Art Project is an outdoor gallery where solo and collaborative works are collectively presented to the public. Locals love the project, and people from all over Melbourne travel to see the works. (This project is now in its third phase. Check out the new Instagram account for updates @graffstreet_projects).
Click the first two images to view short films of our Blacksmiths Way and Upwey Skate Park paintouts.
Click here to view tbC’s drain art projects. tbC also regularly paints in other communities across Melbourne. View these projects here.
Ahmad is a young, self-taught digital illustrator from Jambi, a big city in the middle of Sumatra Island in Indonesia. Ahmad loves to draw girls who wear hijab.
I like drawing Hijab Girls. They are beautiful, and most of my subjects are my friends, my sister or my partner. I'm glad to see them happy and love to present them in this uplifting and positive way.
My artistic style is inspired by vector, WPAP and low poly techniques. I specialise in anomali pop art, a digital design style that uses an existing image as a starting point. This style of artwork reflects modern, everyday, popular culture in an often humorous and/or ironic way. I use photos (with permission) as the basis for my digital drawings. I teach myself design techniques by watching YouTube tutorials, and I get inspiration from my design friends, the internet and social media. I take orders and sometimes my friends ask me to work on their photos. I often make special drawings for birthday presents. I’m currently freelancing but really want to become a professional designer. In the future, I would also like to mentor other young designers.
As a young artist, I love that I have so much time and energy to experiment with my designing. I don't see being young as an obstacle. I have a laptop and the internet – that’s enough for me.
Read more about Ahmad at Hoodie Mag.
Sonya is an illustrator and graphic designer. She has a degree in communication design, majoring in illustration, and, more recently, a Master of Teaching. She freelances and works corporately part-time.
My illustrations combine digital and traditional watercolour styles to meet briefs for street installations, publication, fashion and textile industries. I work with watercolour, gouache, pencil, fineliners and Adobe Creative Suite (for combining elements). Water, patterns, flora and fauna usually inspire my illustrations, and I love blending realistic and abstract elements in my work. I’m currently designing prints for my own sleepwear range and hope to launch an online shop very soon.
Sonya is also Hoodie Mag’s designer. Designing Hoodie Mag has been really fun, especially because I’ve had significant freedom to contribute to its overall look and feel. I’m also really excited about being in the company of so many amazing young artists.
Rosie mainly draws and paints, exploring the darker aspects of the human condition.
I find this exploration personally very therapeutic. I often feel overwhelmed and emotional about life. However, when I arrive at tbC, I choose not to bring these feelings into the space, preferring to symbolically leave them at the door. I do this because I don’t want to interrupt the time I (and my artist friends) have to make art by bringing my emotional concerns into the space. Interestingly, the emotional baggage I choose to leave at the door is often gone when I finish up and head home. I find the time spent focusing on artmaking with other young members of tbC naturally lifts my spirits.
I see tbC’s dedicated arts model as a refreshing alternative to the youth services activities in my community – services that tend to focus more on my health and welfare rather than my creativity.
tiffaney bishop & the SCUMPUPS was a precursor youth arts project to tbC. It began in 2008 and was based in Upwey, on the outskirts of Melbourne, Australia. It ran for four years before morphing into tbC. Like tbC, it was a youth-driven, adult and peer mentored artist-run initiative. The paradoxical nature of the name (an individual and group name sandwiched together) was an intentional device, highlighting the mentor-protégé culture the group was experimenting with.
tiffaney bishop & the SCUMPUPS engaged young people and adults in art and cultural projects that dealt with contemporary youth issues. It developed out of a one-off workshop initiated by a group of 5 thirteen-year-olds (Zoe, Jacqui, Anna, Charlotte and Trentt), all of whom had experienced random, unprovoked violence in their daily lives. These young people wanted to express the way they felt about their community experiences of violence through photography. Together, tiffaney bishop & the SCUMPUPS made photographic artworks that were exhibited in two public exhibitions: We’re Afraid of the Daylight in 2009 and a second called Station Rats and other Scumbags in 2010. While these contemporary bodies of artwork dealt with complex social and cultural issues, the works avoided the more clichéd presentations of young people as dangerous or in danger. Instead, the work celebrated young people and championed their legitimate status as citizens – and artists! It offered developing young artists and activists the opportunity to work collaboratively within a professional, contemporary, artistic environment as well as the opportunity to develop social, cultural and political agency within the broader community.
The word scum was often used to describe young people in Upwey. The artists involved in the collective chose to name themselves the SCUMPUPS in an attempt to reclaim the name as a powerful, positive symbol. Using it in a powerful and positive way liberated these young people from its negative effects. tiffaney bishop & the SCUMPUPS regularly held workshop sessions on the Upwey train station platform in a bid to connect with and engage as many young people as possible. The train station became an alternate studio space and sometimes gallery. The group’s practice focused on (re)imaging young people, addressing widespread prejudices against them, and highlighting the importance of community and artistic agency and status.
tiffaney bishop & the SCUMPUPS also launched the inaugural edition of Hoodie Mag, a youth art and culture magazine that engages young artists and activists in professional publishing practices. The inaugural edition was shortlisted in the 60th Annual Australian Publisher Association’s Book Design Awards for Best Designed Specialist Illustrated Book 2012. It also received a finalist nomination for the Best New Publication For and By Young People Under 30 in the Express Media Literary Book Awards in December 2011.
The success of tiffaney bishop & the SCUMPUPS was mainly due to the group’s professional and autonomous model of arts practice, something that has inspired tbC’s even more ambitious model of collaborative arts practice.
Sponsors and supporters of tiffaney bishop & the SCUMPUPS included the Victorian government’s Office for Youth, Metro Trains, Burrinja Community Arts Centre, Yarra Ranges Council, Belgrave Police, the Victoria Police Youth Foundation, Bendigo Bank, Bell Real Estate, and Upwey Foodworks.
James is a drawer and street artist who has worked on and off with tbC for several years. He is one of Rohan’s best mates and often works with him on collaborative street artworks in Blacksmiths Way, Belgrave.
James is currently training to be a tattooist. His distinctive illustrations are already attracting a strong client base.
Colloquial text is an important part of the materiality of the work tbC makes and presents an evocative and provocative account of the cultural environment young people inhabit. tbC creates T-shirts with personal text grabs printed on them that express how young people feel about themselves and the communities they live in. These T-Shirts present everyday narratives about suburban life and are raw and honest testimonies about what it’s like to be young in the contemporary world.
For many adults, young people’s language and dialogue is nothing more than white noise. Some choose to ignore it; others find it infuriating – even disturbing. Whatever the experience, this raw, combative, irreverent, playful, idiomatic, slang, inane and evocative language is a fundamental resource for learning about and better understanding young people and their creative, cultural, social and political experiences.
The T-Shirt Project has inspired three other text/dialogue-based projects: Episodic, The Art of Conversation (Digital) and The Art of Conversation (Gallery). All three engage audiences in conversations about and with youth people.
The Art of Conversation (Gallery) is a body of 2D artwork on paper containing fine mesh-like layers of text (and sometimes accompanying imagery).
These works present colloquial and visual dialogues about young artists and tbC’s group practices around artistic agency and status. These dialogues emerge from tbC’s social and studio spaces and practices and are authored and presented as a group conversation.
This body of work was exhibited in 2017 in a contemporary art gallery in Melbourne called fortyfivedownstairs. Private and institutional collectors purchased several works.
tbC confronts artistic conventions and tensions around the status of young artists by presenting works like these in the gallery. The group sees gallery exhibition as a way to encourage audiences to take tbC’s artmaking seriously. Presenting tbC artworks within the gallery context invites critical engagement with the work the group makes. It encourages dialogue between the practitioner, audience and critic - about what art is, where it is made and who can make it.
Callum is a photographer, filmmaker and skateboarder. He avidly records images of his urban lifestyle. These images often feature striking perspectives, shapes and colours, and a sharp wit.
While I am often out photographing on my own, I also really enjoy making art in a collaborative environment. At tbC, I feel like I am part of a community, one that is mutually supportive. I appreciate that this space encourages both complimentary and critical feedback. Learning how to accept constructive feedback is really important and helps me grow as an artist, making me more confident to handle the artworld beyond tbC.
I also enjoy learning new things from my collaborators and find tbC’s unstructured and informal learning environment motivating and inspiring. The opportunity for artistic experimentation with multiple mediums while collaborating with other tbC artists is another benefit I value.
Jacinta is an urban explorer. She photographs abandoned and derelict sites on her Olympus M10 Mark II Mirrorless camera and often on her phone.
While I love photographing these places, the experience itself is as important to me as the photographic record I make. I don’t do much editing when I take photos, preferring to leave the images as natural as possible. The site is the hero of my images, not camera techniques. The existing lighting in these derelict places is really interesting, with strangely beautiful shadows and contrast. Damaged walls, dirty, smashed and boarded up windows also create amazing lighting effects.
When asked if she thinks she will stop urban exploring any time soon, Jacinta said, NO! I will probably do it forever! Just like people with the urge to seek out galleries, my friends and I have the urge to seek out derelict spaces. When you think about it, it’s not that different. These spaces arguably share similar exhibition, lighting and spectacle qualities.
As a young artist, I feel I have a lifetime ahead of me. People might see being 18 as a disadvantage, but being this young means I have many years ahead of me to continue doing what I love and progress to where I want to be.
Check out Jacinta’s extended story at Hoodie Mag.
Sam loves to draw. His career aspirations include fashion design, illustration and music. Sam is also a key member of tbC’s Blacksmiths Way Graffiti and Street Art Project.
I am particularly interested in Japanese culture, which is something that drives and inspires my creative output.
Sam is also a talented drummer and spent the last few years playing in a successful band. More recently, he accepted a place in RMIT’s prestigious fashion design degree, where he hopes to transform some of his fashion drawings into reality.
Zak is a stencil artist with a social conscience. His stencil works focus on environmental issues around him. Key words, logos, humour and colour inspire his creative approach. He also uses the internet and magazines for inspiration, modifying words and images in the presentation of his creative and often activist works.
I am an artist because it’s FUN! It gives me something to do away from school.
I am particularly inspired by environmental issues, especially the ones that directly affect me and my community. My last work was especially important to me. It was about the need for a Great Forest National Park in Toolangi. The trees in this forest are being logged at a rate of one MCG stadium a day, and this logging is destroying the Leadbeater Possum’s habitat. The Leadbeater Possum is the State of Victoria’s faunal emblem!
I also love people who stand up for themselves. I love Hosier Lane in Melbourne, Blacksmiths Way in Belgrave and other street artists and sites.
Vertical Platform is a public art project that began in 2012. It sees tbC artists playing around with exhibition conventions by hanging artworks on public walls.
Each artist is presented both as an individual and as a member of an art collective. Each artwork is signed with both the individual artist’s name and tbC’s. While this project sees tbC experimenting with the concept of individual authorship in the collective space, the communal practices and collaborative processes that support the making of these artworks reinforces tbC’s overarching model of collaboration and joint authorship. Vertical Platform presents a united front approach to making and presenting art, one that supports young artists in building artistic agency and status together.
Vertical Platform includes paintings, drawings, poetry, photography and interactive new media works printed onto waterproof (Tyvek) paper and pasted up in and around Upwey and Belgrave.
Zoe is a drawer and painter and also loves photography and travel.
I love the way tbC encourages young members to be creative and persistent and to never give up on their art. Being a member of tbC has meant that I have been a part of many fun and exciting projects and events.
Chalk Talk is an artwork that uses conversation as a medium. Artists use chalk to write out questions on pavements, questions they, their friends and community members passing by answer. These public conversations focus on youth cultural issues.
The Chalk Talk process stimulates casual dialogue around what it’s like to be young in the contemporary world. The public nature of the practice offers young people the opportunity to be seen and heard in a world that often negates or stigmatises them.
By using pavements instead of walls and chalk instead of paint or permanent marker, participants deliberately distance themselves from graffiti and tagging practices. However, the reference to this (anti)social practice is deliberately implied. These sessions are documented with photography and video and shared with the community via the gallery, internet and social media.
Chalk Talk has inspired a digital art project called The Art of Conversation (Digital), which offers the wider community the opportunity to participate in digital, two-way conversations with and about young people.
Brandi is a young Indigenous artist from Mildura, north-west of Melbourne, Australia.
My father is Wiradjuri but was adopted as a young child and didn’t grow up on country. His displacement affected my life too. It disrupted my sense of self and place. Painting and drawing help me deal with this sense of loss and confusion. I explore my identity and my Aboriginality through creative practice. I mainly paint Indigenous portraits, but I’ve been moving towards more impressionistic stuff lately. I’m really enjoying experimenting with my personal style.
As a young artist, I sometimes feel that I’m not taken seriously enough because of my age and experience. I have also had many experiences of racism which makes the feeling of marginalisation even more pronounced.
Aside from my artistic interests, I am studying to be a lawyer. I’d like to think my future work, both within the creative and legal fields, will actively help people understand, acknowledge and reduce racism.
You can read more about Brandi and her work here.
Kate ten Buuren is one of tbC’s original artists. She is interested in photography and text as creative mediums. Kate has been studying film and journalism at university and recently co-developed Melbourne based This Mob – a collective of young Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander artists. Decolonisation is a key focus of This Mob’s creative practice and production. The group aim is to support and promote local Indigenous artists as vital participants in Australia’s contemporary art scene.
Joseph is a painter currently studying at the Victorian College of the Arts. Joseph works mainly with oil paint and loves creating texture through the build-up of many layers of paint.
While I’ve always been a drawer, it wasn’t until year 11 at school that I really became interested in making art. Year 11 was a turning point for me; however, I found that the VCE art curriculum dictated what I should do too much. This interrupted my creative enjoyment and progress. In year 12, I decided to make art about some of the negative experiences I was having with formal arts education, particularly around the ATAR assessment system. This was influenced by the fact that for many of my friends, the pressure to do really well at school and get a good ATAR score was having some negative effects. Many of my friends experienced anxiety and stress-related illnesses, like anorexia. Some were even taking drugs to keep themselves focused on this goal. My Year 12 final submission took the form of a postmodern video about the process of getting an ATAR. It didn’t go over that well. My teacher claimed she had trouble reigning me in. She didn’t seem to see what she expected to see in my work. I felt my work was measured by curriculum goals as opposed to experimental and creative ones. To be honest, I felt that she had missed the point a bit.
Despite these experiences and the disappointment they led to, Joseph is really focused on his artmaking. He is working hard to find the joy that comes from challenging his and other peoples’ thoughts about what it means to be an artist.
Melissa is a painter and a biomedical student. Her paintings depict ethereal, feminine subjects and themes and are often quite grand in scale. Melissa finds that painting balances and calms her busy lifestyle.
Melissa is one of tbC’s original members and features in the first edition of Hoodie Mag.
Daniel is an illustrator who draws with pencils and brushes, as well as digitally. Daniel’s detailed portraits capture his subjects’ gaze in direct and disarming ways.
I began drawing from a young age, and I love to create and design. I find it relaxing and calming and the best way to express who I am. Music, emotions, memories, nature, cities, people and animals inspire my arts practice.
While I love to draw with pencils and brushes on paper, I often use a Wacom tablet and digital drawing software like Photoshop and Illustrator. I am currently studying conceptual art and illustration with an online digital art and animation college. I would love to work in the digital design field.
I feel enriched when I am working with other like-minded artists – even those working in different mediums to me. These interactions provide me with great support and wonderful opportunities to grow and develop my skills, both as an artist and as a person.
Annika is an art therapist, youth arts worker and painter.
I use artmaking as a tool to better understand my experience of the world through a lens of intensely bright colours and whimsical patterns. There is a naivety and youthfulness to my aesthetic, which is both a celebration and reclamation of my 'inner child'. Growing up in the Gold Coast Hinterland has encouraged a deep appreciation of the natural landscape, and my work also reflects this.
I find painting therapeutic and often use it as a healing technique with the young artists I mentor at DRASTIC, a youth-based artist-run initiative on the Gold Coast. I am a creative facilitator at DRASTIC, and I am helping to build a peer-driven therapeutic creative arts and life skills program for young people.
Annika was recently awarded a grant from NAVIGATE (a young artist development program and City of Gold Coast arts and culture initiative) to undertake an arts-based internship at tbC. I hope to develop the skills to run a studio program at Drastic that resembles tbC’s professional approach to collaborative artmaking with young people.
Kenz studies accountancy and is a painter of canvases and walls. He is inspired by people, places, and everyday objects.
I paint works of art that echo reality. They are more like abstractions of reality. My portraits are quirky expressions of the human form. They are not literal, figurative representations but more ethereal. I also like to visually play around with the contrast between the conscious and unconscious mind.
Kenz mainly works with acrylic paints on small to medium canvases but also spray paints on large walls. I love the way these two modes of practice give me a completely different vibe when making. I also love my home-town of Melbourne, especially its cultural diversity and the interesting stories I find when I'm working on the city’s many street art projects.
It’s definitely more fun and interesting to work around and with other people and to hear other people’s opinions. It’s also great to work with people who are like-minded and doing similar things. Working with others inspires my own work. I like to work on other people’s projects, getting close to them. It’s almost like becoming part of a family where everyone helps each other out. I had a few problems recently, and the people around me helped me artistically and personally. I met some really great people as a result. I do love my own space, but as a permanent thing, it can be too isolating. It’s good to be surrounded by others, even if working on your own work.
Clare’s creative practice is a constant self-evaluation of what is important to her. Like many young people, Clare is still asking, ‘Who am I’ and ‘Who do I want to be?’
At high school, I was not very academic, being dyslexic. Art is a much better learning avenue for me. tbC is so relaxing, supportive and inspiring.
For me, tbC is a brilliant studio and community platform for young creatives. It provides a wonderful environment for artmaking and is much better than a school or even a uni, mainly because you don't have time limitations or assignments. You can take the time you need to get into an art grove. It is a perfect place to hang out and create in.
Random Methodologies is an ongoing experimental art project at tbC. It evolved during a discussion in the studio amongst a group of artists who had met for the day to make art together. While making art, young member Damien McIntyre mentioned that he sees numbers as colours. This sparked a deeper conversation around the concept of synaesthesia, the ability some people have to see and even hear in colour. This conversation led to studio experimentation and investigation, culminating in the making of drawings directed by the roll of a die.
Dice Drawings
Dice Drawings began with members of tbC rolling a die and using the random number rolled to dictate the colour and length of lines drawn on paper. tbC artists used Damien’s colour coding and the corresponding centimetre measurements to define these lines. (lines were initially rendered 1cm-6cm but are also often drawn in multiples: 1cm = 10cm, 2cm = 20cm etc.)
#1 - represented a black 1cm line
#2 - represented a yellow 2cm line
#3 - represented a Green 3cm line
#4 - represented a blue 4cm line
#5 - represented a purple 5cm line
#6 - represented a red 6cm line
While initially directed by the random number rolled by the die, the direction of a drawing is up to the artist. Despite these drawings technically being directed by the die, creativity blossoms in the final expression of the drawing. Furthermore, no two artists can roll the same random sequence of numbers, which means each artwork is rendered unique.
Apart from the creative enjoyment tbC members find in making these artworks, they also find the practice wonderfully social. This leads to more discussion and investigation – and more artworks. (Which are described in more detail shortly).
For now, why don’t you stop reading and make your own Dice Drawing? All you need is:
A die (you can download a digital dice app if you want)
Six coloured pens (you can choose your own colours if you want to)
A ruler (if you want to use straight, measured lines)
A small piece of paper (tbC artists found A5 is a good size to start with)
As tbC artists originally did, you can draw straight lines according to Damien’s colour coding and measurements (or multiples of) or, like many others have done since, you can use curved lines, shapes or shading. Send us a photo of your drawing if you want! We are often amazed at what people end up drawing. We’d love to see yours: info@tbcarts.com.
The drawings pictured here form part of a larger body of artwork by tbC artists, printed and exhibited in several galleries in and around Melbourne. Some of these works were digitally rendered and printed out at around 70cm square on fine art paper.
Dice Drawing at tbC sparked a second art project called Random Methodologies (sound).
Random Methodologies (Sound)
This project was developed in collaboration with mentor sound artist Roderick Price. Together, tbC and Rod made generative digital sound artworks where a die roll directed multi-layered aural experiences and compositions.
Sounds, dialogue and music were recorded by tbC from the studio space and the local community and then sampled and edited by Rod to produce multi-layered looped soundtracks. These tracks were programmed into a midi player. The midi player buttons were numbered 1-6, corresponding to a die. Rolling a die directed the participant to activate and deactivate the midi player buttons. Each button pressed added and removed sound loops, creating an evolving soundscape. In playing this game, the player becomes a composer, authoring a unique sound artwork.
Each work is unique yet programmed. Although guided by the roll of a die and the digital interface of the midi player, no two works can ever be the same due to the randomness of the numbers rolled by the die. These soundscapes aren’t always recorded. They are often left as impermanent, ephemeral artistic experiences.
Here are three we recorded to document the project:
Random Methodologies (or Sonic Sketching) 1
Random Methodologies (or Sonic Sketching) 2
Random Methodologies (or Sonic Sketching) 3
These experimental and investigative studio experiences have inspired more artworks that continue to focus on in-studio conversations.
The Art of Conversation (Digital) and The Art of Conversation (Gallery).
tbC’s exhibition practices include the presentation of artworks in formal and informal spaces.
For example, the studio allows young artists to present artworks in development. These works are hung (often salon-style) for family, friends and the local community to view. This less intimidating experience provides young artists with important feedback as they explore artistic mediums and materials. It also prepares the young artist for more formal exhibition opportunities.
Outdoor spaces provide artists with opportunities to present work more publicly. tbC artists regularly present work throughout Melbourne’s CBD and the city’s inner and outer suburbs. Again, while these experiences are generally less intimidating and feel less formal than the gallery space, they deliver the young artist significant visibility and recognition. This prepares the young artist for more formal artworld attention.
The gallery is harder for the young artist to gain access to. Young tbC artists report that their limited artistic biographies and records of practice hinder access to gallery spaces. Nevertheless, the gallery plays an important role in the professional development of young artists. tbC’s response to this exclusion is to collaborate in building sophisticated bodies of artwork that appeal to gallery managers. This has resulted in tbC being granted exhibition opportunities in several formal gallery spaces, including; Burrinja Gallery in Upwey, Footscray Community Art Centre’s Roslyn Smorgon Gallery, Noosa Regional Art Gallery, Muswellbrook Regional Art Centre, Stirrup Gallery in Sydney, fortyfivedownstairs in Melbourne and the (e)merge Art Fair in Washington D.C. (curated by Connersmith Gallery).
tbC artists welcome the critical feedback from these varied presentation experiences, arguing that early exhibition practices result in earlier professional development.
Episodic is a narrative-based project that presents serialised stories about and by young people to the local community. Stories are told in micro instalments via a number of sites and methods. The first version of this project presented stories on a highly visible gallery wall over the course of several months. Episodes changed weekly until the story was told.
A range of actions and happenings occurred in conjunction. Artists inscribed text on community pavements in chalk that mirrored the text displayed on the gallery wall. Social media posts documented the project, inviting broader audiences within the community to engage with the work. The project was inspired by tbC’s Chalk Talk practice and the work of seventeen-year-olds Kate ten Buuren and Charisse Walton.
Episodic resulted in a second serialised art project involving the use of Morse Code to tell tbC stories. Micro stories were designed in vertical formats to fit the many doorways along Belgrave’s Blacksmiths Way, the site of tbC’s major Street art project. These door spaces weren’t that appealing to graffiti and street artists, which meant we had many small sites to work with. The main idea was to get the community to come by and decode the stories. This ‘decoding’ meant a visitor had to spend some time in the space engaging with our stories.
