Fashion. Performance. Industry - ANAT
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CONTEMPORARY ART
OF AUSTRALIA & ASIA-PACIFIC
Issue 41:1 | April 2021
AUS $20
Fashion.
Industry.
Performance.
Cover image:
Alba Stephen and Rachel Buckeridge
Circumnavigate Kandos “Fried Egg Dress”, 2019
Model: David Ryan. Photo: Ian Hobbs. Image courtesy of Rachel
Buckeridge. Disclaimer: The cover image for this issue of Artlink
was selected by the magazine. Guest editor, author and Kandos
host of From the Clothes Rack to the Wearer: Circumnavigate
Kandos, Ann Finegan did not take part in this decision.
Artlink is a themed magazine on contemporary art and culture
from Australia and the Asia-Pacific. The opinions expressed are
not necessarily those of the editor or publisher. Artlink has peer
review status as an independent journal for critical writing on the
contemporary visual arts in compliance with the Australian Higher
Education Research Data Collection (HERDC) specifications and is
listed on the Australian Research Council ERA 2012 journal list.
© No part of this publication may be reprinted or electronically
reproduced without permission.
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ABN 490 632 261 39
ISSN: 0727-1239
Fashion. Performance. Industry. 41:1 | April 2021
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Issue 41:1__April 2021__
Fashion. Performance. Industry.
08___ Editorial 62___ From the clothes rack to the body of the wearer:
Circumnavigate Kandos in our clothes
12___ What is Transorientalism? Ann Finegan
Adam Geczy
68___ On art, fashion, purpose and more
24___ Walkabout style: Peggy Griffiths-Madij and Jan Griffiths
Dreams and visions of Indigenous fashion in conversation with Alana Hunt
Tristen Harwood
74___ Cigdem Aydemir: Like a Prayer
30___ #IMadeMyClothes: Sumaiya Muyeen
The Ethics and Practices of
Home Dressmaking 80___ Michaela Stark: On Control and Beauty
Madeleine C. Seys Alison Kubler
34___ Green Plastics – Blue Ocean: 84___ Apprehending the Multiverse:
The future of biopolymer plastics and textiles A Costumed Allegory for Four Percussionists
Niki Sperou Michaela Gleave’s Cosmic Time
Ann Finegan
40___ The Mangkaja x Gorman Collection:
A new wave of Indigenous art and 91___ Reviews
fashion collaboration
Belinda Cook
48___ Melanie Jame Wolf’s Pop-Cultural Drag:
The Chronopolitics of Labour,
Libido and Image
Daniel Mudie Cunningham
More reviews and
56___ Sarah Rodigari:
online archive at
Redressing the vernacular
Abigail Moncrieff artlink.com.au
Green Plastics – Blue Ocean
The future of biopolymer plastics and textiles
Niki Sperou Niki Sperou
Guilt 5, 2020
from the series
Plastics Memento Mori
ANAT Synapse 2020
residency at CMBD
Photo courtesy the artist
34 | Artlink Issue 41:1 | April 2021
We are living in the age of and technological challenges impossible, how can we design a
the Capitalocene, an epoch of towards a more sustainable future. circular economy with zero waste as
environmental crisis resulting from Plastics are useful and ubiquitous, our goal? How can we create cultural
capitalist commerce and industry. and demand for them is rising. shifts to promote change and influence
According to finance website Business Processing of plastic waste is difficult policy? How can we do better?
Insider, in 2019 the fashion industry and expensive. By 2050, plastic Our Green Plastics – Blue Ocean
accounted for 10% of humanity’s waste is predicted to be nearing 12 project utilises marine technology
total global carbon emissions. billion tonnes, with approximately for innovative options. Seaweed is
Nathaniel Otjen, in When Things 79% of that entering the environment. probably one of the most prolific and
Hail: The Material Encounter in Microplastic health-related concerns underutilised renewable resources on
Anthropocene Literature, concedes are increasing due to food chain the planet. It grows faster than any
that “We recognize we are now entry and toxic bioaccumulation. land plant, benefits the environment by
‘being acted upon’ by material The need to reduce or to replace absorbing atmospheric carbon dioxide
agents of our own creation”. This fossil-fuel plastic is urgent. The 2025 emissions and does not compete for
realisation is driving a movement National Packaging Targets aim for fresh water or arable land. Seaweed
toward eco-conscious endeavours. 100% of Australia’s packaging to be biopolymers have unique film-forming
The Green Plastics – Blue Ocean reusable, recyclable or compostable. properties unparalleled by terrestrial
project, supported by the ANAT 2020 Early plastics were produced with plant starch-based plastics.
Residency and Copyright Agency the best of intentions. Seen as cheaper, South Australia has been
Fund, was a response to the global more democratic and accessible to the identified as a global hotspot for
petroleum-based plastics waste masses, petroleum plastics replaced marine macroalgae. Australia does
problem. Through interdisciplinary rare and finite materials sourced from not currently farm seaweed, although
collaboration between myself, artist wild and domesticated organisms. the potential for this to expand into
in residence at Flinders University’s For burgeoning industry, they were a major industry is significant. The
Department of Medical Biotechnology an exciting new product. Due to recently released ‘Australian Seaweed
and the Centre for Marine Bioproducts their stable chemistry, petroleum Industry Blueprint’, commissioned by
Development (CMBD) since 2006, plastics take centuries to degrade. The AgriFutures Australia, predicts growth
CMBD Director Professor Wei unforeseen problem was the waste. potential for a $1.5 billion industry by
Zhang, biotechnologist Peng Su and How can we deal with the 2040 and a 10% emissions reduction
the CMBD team, the potential for human-created mess? Can we reduce target. By utilising beach-cast seaweed
biodegradable seaweed biopolymers the future impact of petroleum plastics from South Australia’s south-eastern
was explored while probing the on society with next-generation coastline, we worked towards the
world’s biggest ethical, environmental materials? If clean-up is currently transition from petrochemistry
Issue 41:1 | April 2021 Artlink | 35
as well as cosmetics, medicine,
nutrition and other applications that
included medical scaffolds in bone
regeneration, prostheses and implants,
biodegradable agricultural films, and
biodegradable food-packing materials
that are edible and antimicrobial.
Functional compounds from seaweed
can be extracted for antioxidant,
antimicrobial, antiviral, anticancer,
antitumour, immunomodulatory
activity, antidiabetic, anti-STD,
anti-inflammatory and anticoagulant
properties, and also for blood lipid
and cholesterol reduction and
dietary fibre prebiotic activity.
Drawing on experience in the
to green chemistry, producing better comprehend the drivers of area of dress design and garment
biodegradable materials that allow the human impetus for change. construction, water-soluble seaweed
nature to complete the carbon cycle. A series of memento mori polymers and films were tested
Developing the technology photographic images, titled Guilt, as ecofriendly fabric stabilisers to
was not the stand-alone focus of was inspired by Anthropocene support delicate fabrics, open-work
this project. We aimed to develop literature and online images of victims embroidery and appliqués. This was
questions and communicate of plastic waste. In these images, followed by the trialling of various
unconventional ideas, metaphors and my body was used to represent technologies and composites to
realities, allowing us to rethink our animals engulfed in plastic to create develop the film’s water-resistant
relationship with plastics. Societal effect and reinforce that we too properties. A challenge was to avoid
needs, trends and mindsets were are impacted by plastic waste. partial petroleum-based constituents
examined. We sought insight into Seaweed polymers were produced as with other eco-plastics on the
how the replacement of existing in numerous forms: gels, fibres, 2D market. In this research, seaweed
dependence on petrochemical products films and 3D foams/matrix/scaffolds. biopolymer skin was made as a
requires cultural understanding A broad range of prototypes were prototype nutraceutical cosmetic, then
and acceptance, and we needed to made for art, fashion and textiles, tested for its adherent and film-forming
36 | Artlink Issue 41:1 | April 2021
Above:
Niki Sperou
marine macroalgal biodegradable plastic film
ANAT Synapse 2020 residency at CMBD
Photo courtesy the artist
Opposite:
Niki Sperou
Marine algal (seaweed) biopolymer plastic
ANAT Synapse 2020 residency at CMBD
Photo courtesy the artist
Issue 41:1 | April 2021 Artlink | 37Above:
Niki Sperou
Crisis Mask
biodegradable polymer
ANAT Synapse 2020
residency at CMBD
Photo courtesy the artist
Opposite:
Niki Sperou
dissolvable film for fabric
stabiliser (after washing)
ANAT Synapse 2020
residency at CMBD
Photo courtesy the artist
38 | Artlink Issue 41:1 | April 2021tendencies over a 3D form. The nanopore textile prototypes with
production of a biomimetic Seaweed seaweed’s innate anti-viral properties.
Biopolymer Leather – FYKI followed. The production of a biopolymer
This vegan leather can be cut like leather was inspired by Canadian
traditional textiles and leathers, but can artist and sci-fi religious mythmaker
also be poured or computer printed into Michael Dudeck, who contacted me
shape, avoiding offcuts—a step closer with the dream of a bible made out of
to zero waste design. Our product was leather from his own skin. Towards
named FYKI after the Greek word for future collaboration, a seaweed leather
seaweed. With society increasingly infused with Dudeck’s cells was
aware of the ecological and ethical proposed. This creative endeavour
issues related to breeding, raising, fitted nicely with CMBD research,
killing, tanning, resource consumption and my longstanding production of
and methane generation associated fleshy chimeras, matrices for the
with livestock industries, the option of methodologies of science, human-plant
vegan leather satisfies the moral and hybrids and ancient Greek myth and
environmental imperative for change. ritual. The concept for Skin Bible and shape our future. For me, the
The artwork Crisis Mask was was presented at the TTT (Taboo probing of technological problems,
made out of this biodegradable – Transgression – Transcendence) responsibility, potential futures and the
antiviral marine biopolymer leather 2020 conference in Vienna. The rethinking of plastics evokes hope.
and served as a response to two work embraces the broader field
current and related problems. The first of laboratory-grown textiles and
was the plastics pollution problem materials. Examples are the cell-seeded
recently exacerbated by medical waste, scaffolds of Ear Mouse, Vacanti; Extra
gloves and masks, generated by the Ear, Stelarc; Victimless Leather, Tissue Niki Sperou is an Australian artist working
COVID-19 pandemic. Fashioned Culture & Art; Spray on Skin, burns at the nexus of art and science since
after intriguing masks worn by specialist Fiona Wood; rePurposed, 2001. Niki presents artwork, bio-art
17th-century plague doctors, Crisis Andrew Pelling; and, in the area of workshops and conference papers in
Mask was crafted from seaweed vegan bio-leathers, Fermented Fashion Australia and internationally. She is the
leather that mimics the colour, texture of cellulose “scoby” biofilm textiles artist-in-residence at the Department of
and handling of animal-derived leather. by Garry Cass and Donna Franklin. Medical Biotechnology and the Centre
In turn, the Crisis Mask concept Why do we do this? Artists for Marine Bioproducts Development,
prompted research into breathable are essential to how we imagine School of Medicine, Flinders University.
Issue 41:1 | April 2021 Artlink | 39You can also read
