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                    Public Art Melbourne Biennial Lab

                    What Happens now
                    In early 2016, the City of Melbourne invited early to mid-career artists to imagine and develop new encounters within the municipality through our inaugural Public Art Melbourne Biennial Lab. Titled What Happens Now? It was led by Chief Curator Natalie King.

                    In the June phase of Biennial Lab 2016, 14 selected artists explored bold, creative ideas in an aesthetically and intellectually rigorous situation, at our Queen Victoria Market site. Over an intense two-week period, they developed concepts in a laboratory environment under the mentorship of international public art experts. The Lab was co-convened by international affiliate Claire Doherty (Director, Situations) and Professor David Cross (One Day Sculpture/Iteration: Again/Head of Art and Performance, Deakin University).

                    Public presentation of the artworks took place during the Melbourne Festival from 17 to 23 October 2016. Daily guided tours took visitors through the artworks at various locations in the market. The Biennial Lab culminated in a final day of artist-led workshops, talks, walking tours, performances and a closing event on Sunday 23 October 2016.

                    From elaborate and evocative installations to ethereal moments of human connection and release, this suite of temporary new works reinterpreted the market; probing its Indigenous, mercantile, migratory and colonial past, sharing its secrets and celebrating its stories.

                    Read more on the Biennial Lab website.

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                    Photos from 2016 Biennial Lab

                    A woman wearing an artwork while standing in the middle of a Shed at the Queen Victoria MarketA woman wearing an artwork and holding an overflowing trolley of fruit boxes and fabric while standing in the middle of a Shed at the Queen Victoria MarketMiniature fruit sculptures sitting on a table, in front of life-size fruit in a Queen Victoria Market stallA man and a woman with microphones talking to a crowd at the Queen Victoria MarketAn artwork at the Queen Victoria Market - black and yellow stripes on the ground and going up a wall, with mirrors on the roof. The strips are arranged to sit at the same angles as the Hoddle Grid.Girl with rope and two pairs of hands holding a straight piece of rope in front of a black and yellow striped wall.The top of a small building with 'Upon this troubled sea' written on the top in neon against a dark skyAn open metal storage cart with a projected animation of a man dancing with his eyes closed.A busy marketplace in the centre of Queen Victoria Market, selling clothes and knick knacks, with three people standing in front of microphones singing and reading sheet music.Four members of Field Theory are dressed in daggy clothes and sunglasses standing in front of a colourful artworkThe roof of one of the sheds at the Queen Victoria Market with lots of items for sale in the bottom of the picture. In the top of the roof is a neon artwork in different colours.A market stallholder making a hand gesture to a customer, with rockmelons and pineapples being sold.A few of people sitting together and discussing something, with a blackboard that reads: Now in session - Make or Break. In the foreground, two people sit minding a stall, and to the left, a man is giving guidelines to a woman.Two people looking at the camera with sculptures of watermelons on a table in foreground, and a group discussion happening in the background.An aboriginal elderon the ground, lighting some eucalyptus leaves for a smoking ceremony, and is wearing a jacket with a possum skin over the top, on the site of the Queen Victoria Market.A sculpture surrounding a monument to John Batman. There's a hole that allows viewers to read the inscription on the original sculpture, and a family are looking in.Image of a green cage-like structure opened up with mirrored surfaces that have Woiwurrung words written on them. Three people sit on the sculpture with microphones in front, talking to an audience.Two red posters with the New Rules for Public Art in Melbourne printed on them
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