One Night In Footscray 2019 Artist Interview #1

Melbourne Art Review: Tell us about your work for One Night In Footscray 2019. Clinton Green: For ONIF 2019, I am part of a broader group/collective performance from A General Assembly of Interested Parties (GAIP) entitled INTERSECTION. The intention of this work is very loose and open-ended, based simply around an instruction to cross the road for several hours. This is been an annual ritual for GAIP participants over the past few years. For me, it is a way of exploring the limits of performance practice and public space, in a way that is inclusive, with very fuzzy edges. In previous years, other activities and actions tend to develop from this primary instruction – street performance, dance/movement, conversations about art and performance. No one has any way of knowing what will happen this year at ONIF, besides the fact that the road will be crossed many times. GAIP is a fluid network of artists and performers founded by Ren Walters around 2011. The GAIP website explains, “GAIP may appear as a performance that does not depend on performers…GAIP may appear without a performance frame. In so doing, GAIP finds expression through the inter-being of participants willing to be human.” My own work originates in experimental music and sound art, which has extended in recent years to performance, kinetic sound sculpture, and site-specific video projection. MAR: How does your ONIF work fit into your arts practice? CG: ONIF is a good fit for my interest in making work in interesting/non-traditional sites and public performance. As a local, I also love the opportunity ONIF offers to present work to my own community. I’ve been fortunate to have been involved in all three ONIFs so far, and last year I was part of the organizing committee. I was keen to get involved initially as ONIF demonstrated a willingness to bring cutting edge art performance to the literal man/woman in the street. Usually, I have to traipse north to the cool side of town for performance opportunities. ONIF is a great opportunity to foster these practices closer to home. A big plus for me is the opportunity to present work to large mainstream audiences that are generally outside the more niche audiences I usually present to. I also love the opportunity to interact with and present work in parts of my home town. MAR: What stands out for you in 2019’s ONIF offering? CG: Snuff Puppets – always worth encountering, renegade Footscray icons. Afterthoughts + Before Nightfall –very excited about this virtuosic collaboration between Speak Percussion and soprano Jane Sheldon (I can’t believe this is free, like all of ONIF!) Sikander’s Sitars’n’Bleeps – this will be a fun way to unwind and celebrate the end of the Festival. But most of all, I encourage people to just wander, see what you encounter. Footscray was recently named in the top ten coolest neighbourhoods in the world; you know that means it will soon be all over, so come visit quickly before it becomes as homogenized as all the other “cool” suburbs. MAR: What are your favourite spaces in one of the top 10 coolest suburbs in the world? CG: Yen Huot gift shop in Paisley street bends the laws of time and space by somehow stocking absolutely everything you can think of, as well as many you’ve never thought of. The staff are very friendly and helpful and will unearth that plastic clog in the shape of a strawberry you need from under a pile of wigs in aisle 5 (not that the aisles are actually numbered). I’d love to do a performance in there one day… MAR: What advice would you give to artists wanting to get involved in ONIF? CG: Tailor and adapt your work for ONIF and Footscray itself, don’t just expect to plonk your standard act into the festival. ONIF is very much a site-specific experience, and works need to respond to this. MAR: What are you working on next? CG: Currently working on somehow taking the main sound sculpture I’ve been developing for the last year or so (powered by three turntables) into a professional recording studio… MAR: Thanks for chatting to us Clinton! For more info on this year's One Night In Footscray see the Facebook event here.  One Night In Footscray 2019