The first of two films about Australian and part-Aboriginal artist Archie Moore who creates a ceramic art installation at Bar Loco in Newcastle. Throughout the film Archie talks about what this art works means to him within the context of alienation and landscape. The film also includes contributions from Dr Matthew Johnson, a lecturer in the Department of Politics, Philosophy and Religion at Lancaster University who help bring Archie to Newcastle for this exhibition. Over the opening title...

The first of two films about Australian and part-Aboriginal artist Archie Moore who creates a ceramic art installation at Bar Loco in Newcastle. Throughout the film Archie talks about what this art works means to him within the context of alienation and landscape. The film also includes contributions from Dr Matthew Johnson, a lecturer in the Department of Politics, Philosophy and Religion at Lancaster University who help bring Archie to Newcastle for this exhibition. Over the opening title a montage of still images taken during the opening of the Archie Moore exhibition featuring both Aboriginal and European participants. Title: Relocating Land, Memory and Place: A Cross-Cultural Exchange Matthew Johnson from Lancaster University talks to camera about how people deal with alienation, being uncomfortable being the person you are in a hostile place or reluctant to accommodate you on your terms. As part of group discussion Aboriginal artist Archie Moore discusses his mixed-heritage identity and issues of racism growing up on a small Australian town. As he continues to speak, he approaches and going inside Bar Loco on Leazes Park Road in Newcastle. On the second floor of the bar the System Gallery currently empty. Outside Bar Loco slabs of Terracotta clay which Archie and two women carry inside and upstairs placing them onto the gallery floor. Archie unfurls a large plastic sheet and lays it out on the floor. Matthew Johnson talks about the two communities involved in this art project that under certain contexts feel uncomfortable and how the installation can help them come together in dialogue, Archive still speaking as part of the group discussion talks about how he has been made to feel at times both not white enough or black enough. As he continues to speak in the gallery, he begins to lay out the slabs on clay on the plastic sheeted floor. Talking to camera Archie describes the installation he is working on as being about landscape, place, and identity. On the floor he moulds the clay using his fingers, as he talks about how the landscape has been changed and erased by industrialisation and farming he pushes a tractor tyre across a line of clay creating groves. Some of the clay has dried and cracked in the floor, this Archie explains represents a dislocated landscape and well as loss of traditional Aboriginal connections to the land. Writing from a ‘post-punk’ band is written on a wall, this resonated with Archie growing up in a small town. It reads ‘the path of least resistance leads to the garbage heap of despair’ and ‘I’m just a symptom of the moral decay that’s gnawing at the heart of the country’. Archie continues to work on his installation cutting and placing pieces of clay on the floor, he provides more information on the symbolism of his work to his upbringing. Once again, he pushes a tractor wheel through the clay. Standing beside a brick wall inside the gallery Archive talks about the symbolism related to a clay pipe he holds in his hand. He places a label on bottles of perfume, a visitor to the gallery takes it and smells the content. Archive breaks the clay pipe and places it on a shelf to form part of the installation. During the opening visitors stand around chatting over drinks. On the floor the dried and cracked clay which symbolises an empty piece of scrubland to be used for more fertile purposes. Matthew Johnson in shorts and t-shirt comes into the gallery space and begins to rip up the clay and taking them out in bags for disposal. To him this act symbolises the European colonialisation of the Australian continent. The installation gone the gallery returns to an empty space. Title: For more information, please visit: Title: A Cross-Cultural Working Group on ‘Good Culture’ and Precariousness: http://wp.lancs.ac.uk/good-culture Title: Relocating Land, Memory of Place: A Cross Cultural Exchange: http://wp.lancs.ac.uk/good-culture/events/relocating-land-memory-and-place-a-cross-cultural-exchange/ Title: Archie Moore: http://archiemoore.wordpress.com/ Title: Matt Calder Ceramics: http://www.facebook.com/MattCalderCeramics Title: Matthew Johnson: http://www.lancaster.ac.uk/ppr/about-us/people/matthew-johnson Title: Thanks to Bar Loco, Egle Dubinkaite, Faculty of Arts and Social Sciences (FASS) Lancaster University, Jane Purcell, Linda O’Keeffe, Mary Graham, Murri Mura Aboriginal Corporation, Patrick Bishop, Roger Appleton, Tom Johnson, Howard Dickenson Credits: Produced by Faze3films info@faze3films.uk Executive Producer Lancaster University End credit: © 2015 Faze 3 Films. All rights reserved