TINY STADIUMS FESTIVAL

“You can have a festival in your bedroom!” exclaims Tiny Stadiums director, Jade Markham. Perhaps not bedroom, but certainly backyard, as is the case for this boutique, site-specific festival taking place in Erskineville village for a fortnight from February 22. Markham says Tiny Stadiums aims to loosen, “the boundaries of what an art experience can be” – so you go to grab a coffee, and come back having dabbled in some conformist dancing with the group Parachutes for Ladies, shared a snot-splattered hanky with Sob Stories’ Amy Spiers, spied Applespiel’s paddlepop stick replica of Erskineville or caught what Markham describes as gigs that aren’t gigs, Gooey on the Inside and What the Thunder Said. Markham’s own project, Bunheads, plays with the most everyday of materials – hair. “Bunheads is a way of honoring hairdressing as a wonderful art,” says Markham, “it usually exists backstage of the fashion shows, and I wanted to bring it front of house.” Between 2-5pm on Mar 6 and 7, they will, “create a dream hairdressing salon … like a party, like a club!” with DJs, lighting, and the hairdos video-channeled to other screens dotted throughout the village. Fellas are welcome and if you find buns a bit stuffy, why not try cornrows? “It’s a really gentle work. [In the last version] everyone was really confused but went with it!” Zoe Meagher stages a similarly non-obtrusive interactive installation, Photo-op. “It came from the observation that we are living in a culture saturated by images, we are constantly sharing images of ourselves – it’s an attempt to make literal the sense of ‘always being on.’” To do this, Photo-op reverses the role of subject/object so the photographer (you!) is the ever moving one, and the photographed (Meagher and Naziath Mantoo) stay still. “The most important part is the performance and it being a shared experience between the performers and whoever happens to wander by, people can come make of it what they like.” No matter what you wander by during the Tiny Stadiums fortnight, you’re in for a pleasant surprise.

Feb 22-Mar 7, Erskineville Village, mostly free, find out more at quarterbred.blogspot.com/