CHAD PEACOCK

WESTERN SKIES

Over the past ten years I have been commissioned to document landmark art and tourism projects including ‘The Giants of Mandurah’, ‘Public Silo Art Trail’ and ‘Tracks We Share’ along with several series of long play video projects for large scale public screens showcasing the diverse beauty of our state. I have also collaborated with various artists and had my work exhibited in many of the states finest cultural institutions including The Art Gallery of WA, Holmes à Court Gallery (‘Portent’ for Perth Festival 2024), John Curtin Gallery & Fremantle Art Centre.

Over the course of capturing these projects my aim has always been to capture the essence of a given place, and as much as I loved capturing the specific projects it was capturing the surrounding visuals & community stories that was a true highlight for me.

In short I fell in love with regional WA and its unique people and places.

While I was putting together a proposal for a recent artist residency (Shark Bay) I got to thinking…wouldn’t it be amazing to offer a condensed version of this residency to other regions across WA? What if I could get a number of these regions to partner in the project and make it a large scale project that could be utilised both for commercial marketing purposes (ie local councils and tourism) while also building a body of original artworks to be exhibited in cultural institutions across WA?

The goal would be to spend a concentrated amount of time in each region (5-7 days each) and build a body of work capturing the essence and unique character of each region informed by the people and the places. A key part of the project would be capturing oral histories in each location from the perspective of people who live there. Through partnering with local schools and community groups I would run workshops on interview technique and leave an audio recorder in each town for a set period of time so locals can interview each other and capture their own stories in their own way without the influence of an outsider (example we produced here). Indigenous voice and context would be a core component of the project and we would partner with community groups and elders in each region to ensure the ancient stories and history of our amazing state would be represented.

Each participating partner would then get access to a wide variety of digital assets (video, sound, and stills) that they can repurpose and utilise for marketing purposes (see samples below) while certain works captured will be curated specifically for exhibition purposes.

The exhibition would tour across major regional art galleries as a series of large scale fine art photographic prints, digital video projection along with a publication culminating in a Perth exhibition as part of Perth Festival.

THE REGIONS

Peel (Mandurah)

South West (Bunbury, Dunsborough, Margaret River, Denmark)

Great Southern (Albany, Stirling ranges)

Goldfields (ie Kalgoorlie and Esperance)

Wheatbelt (ie Dowerin)

Gascoyne (Shark Bay)

Mid West (Geraldton, Kalbarri)

Pilbara (Cossack, Karatha, Hedland)

Kimberley (Broome and Kununurra)

The main components captured are as follows:

(1) Aerial photography and videography for exhibition and also marketing (drone and or light aircraft).

(2) Community Workshops (photography, videography, oral history)