Travelling Colony at Carriageworks - 17 January

Happy new year for 2012. January is a bit of a quiet time for galleries and we are only just getting into the swing. First up for us is our first visit out to Carriageworks to see Brook Andrew's Travelling Colony.

Brook is a fairly high profile contemporary aboriginal artist (as in I've seen his stuff in big things like the biennale and I can recognise it!) and this work is part of the 'Black Capital' programme of the Sydney Festival that focuses on Redfern being the aboriginal capital of Australia (and former residence of yours truly back in the day). For this show Brook has handpainted about half a dozen land yachts (aka caravans) in graphic aboriginal patterns and installed a tv in each with local residents giving their stories of Redfern. I liked them. We even overheard someone ask what they were doing with the caravans at the end of the show as he wanted to tow one around. Not a bad idea, although I reckon Woollahra Council might complain if we parked one outside Big Lamington HQ for a stretch.

It's hard to give the points this week as I can't really distinguish between each caravan, they all comprise the show. I did prefer the red, black and gold one which echoes the colours of the aboriginal flag. I might take the kids back to run around Carriageworks and get a better photo as the ones available on the web aren't that good. So lets just give Brook the best on ground for today.