About the project
Promoting visual art & culture to the world
Cultural Conversations is promoting Australian and South Korean visual arts and culture to the world through the stories of its eminent artists told by the artists themselves.
At the core of the Cultural Conversations project are professionally filmed interviews. These interviews of up to 60 minutes are in-depth discussions of the life and work of pre-eminent artists, their voices, their stories, their insights and their characters preserved for posterity. Sadly, one subject already in the archive, the sculptor Bert Flugelman, has recently passed away, underlining the importance of preserving the voices of our contemporary artists for future generations. This archive is an irreplaceable primary source in the recording of our cultural history: an invaluable resource for everyone interested in our cultural life and for future students and historians.
Rationale:
The health of a culture depends on many things. But one of the most important is the connection between one generation and those who have gone before them. This connection brings a sense of belonging to the ongoing project which is art: reflection through an aesthetic prism on who we are as individuals and as a society.
This connection also helps mentor and counsel each succeeding generation, contributing to the education of young artists and promoting a deeper appreciation of our own art by the public.
Hence, the importance of documenting our cultural history. Certainly, this can be done in part by academic study, by print publications, by exhibitions and by collections in museums. But crucial to preserving our cultural heritage is the oral history – to see and hear artists talk about their work, their lives and their careers. In other words, to see and hear the artists tell their stories in their own words.
The video interviews which form the heart of the project take advantage of the new digital technology to show our artists in the context of their studios with supporting images of their work talking about their life and work.
Cultural Conversations represents an online record able to be accessed by educators, students, artists and the interested public and linked to other collections such as
Design and Art Australia Online.
About Dr Paul McGillickDr Paul McGillick has had an extensive and varied career as a writer, editor and curator in the fields of art, architecture and design. He is also the author of and a contributor to numerous books in these fields, along with many catalogue essays. He was for many years the visual and performing arts critic for the Australian Financial Review. For some years he was Series Editor and a producer and presenter with SBS TV's arts show, 'Imagine', later working for ABC TV's 'Art Show'. He has recently returned to video production with short films on residential and interior architecture.
About the Australian Centre for Oral HistoryThe
Australian Centre for Oral History is an initiative of
Turtle Lane Studios Pty Ltd applying Testimony Software to the field of oral history. The Centre is the home of this project as well as working with other oral history projects in Australia and overseas in publishing oral history material online.
About Adj. Associate Professor Yvonne BoagAssociate Professor Yvonne Boag, one of the principals of Turtle Lane Studios Pty Ltd, is an Australian artist with an impressive exhibition record in Australia, Europe, South Korea and Japan. She has held many artist-in-residencies and is represented in major public and private collection in Australia and overseas. She regularly exhibits in group and one-person shows. She has formed strong links with the arts community in South Korea and consults to organisations like Sydney College of the Arts of the University of Sydney on building and maintaining collaborations and exchange relationships. Her digital archive can be seen at
http://www.yvonneboag.com.au.
About Dr Bob JansenDr Bob Jansen, one of the principals of
Turtle Lane Studios Pty Ltd, is the technical director for this project. He designed and programmed the Testimony Software system used to deliver the interviews through this web site. He has over 30 years experience in the ICT industry in Australia and Europe, having worked as Principal Research Scientist in and Program Manager of, the Knowledge Based Systems Program for CSIRO, the English computer firm ICL, various international R&D organisations, and for the last twelve years, as a owner and consultant of Turtle Lane Studios. He started the Austrtaliasn Centre for Oral History, see above. He has consulted to the University of Alaska's oral history program, Project Jukebox, and completed a Testimony Software site for the Alaska Historical Society bringing excerpts of the original recordings of the
1956 Alaska Constitution Convention to students.
About CADRE DesignCADRE Design, is Australia's leading developer of innovative eLearning and interactive multimedia. They are providing the graphic design resources for this project and are currently collaborating on the final design of this web site.
About Professor Lee Ihnbum
Professor Ihnbum Lee of SangMyung University began his career as the Curator of Seoul’s National Museum of Modern Art and has contributed continuously since to the development of criticism, theory, education and practice in the milieu of Korean contemporary art.
About Dr. Yoon Jin Sup
Yoon Jin Sup is a freelance curator, art critic and artist who lives in Seoul, Korea. He recently curated ‘Dansaekhwa: Korean Monochrome Painting’, which he guest-curated for the National Museum of Contemporary Art, Korea in 2012 and ‘The Art of Dansaekhwa’ at Kukje Gallery, Seoul, in 2014. He is currently President of the International Association of Art Critics (AICA) International Congress, Korea, 2014 and Consultant of the Association of Korean Art Critics.
윤진섭은 서울에서 활동하고 있는 독립큐레이터, 미술평론가, 작가이다. 그는 2012년에 국립현대미술관에서 '한국의 단색화'전을, 2014년에 국제갤러리에서 '단색화의 예술전'을 기획한 바 있다. 그는 현재 2014년에 서울에서 열린 국제미술평론가협회의 조직위원장이며 한국미술평론가협회 고문으로 있다.
About Suh Yong Sun
Suh Yongsun studied Fine Arts at Seoul National University from 1975 to 1982 and worked as a professor at the College of Fine Arts at this University from 1986 to 2008. After withdrawing from his long-time professorship, he was elected Korea's Artist of the Year for 2009 and honored with a solo show at the National Museum of Contemporary Art, South Korea. He was invited to residency programs in Vermont in the United States of America in 1995 and to the Monash University in Melbourne, Australia, both in 2006 and in 2010. He also worked at the University of Paris in 2003. In 2001 he was a visiting professor in Hamburg, Germany.
Supporters & ContributorsThe project gratefully acknowledges and thanks the following for their support and contribution to the project. Without their vision, support and contributions, the project would not be where it is today.
Dr. Paul McGillick, for giving his time to assist in driving and steering the project as well as doing some of the interviews
Adj. Associate Professor Yvonne Boag, for her time in managing the steering the project, as well as her work in setting up opportunities in South Korea
Dr. Bob Jansen, for his time in managing the technical side and the back office functions of the project as well as managing and steering the project
The Team at CADRE Design, for their expertise in designing the web site. We especially acknowledge the work of Melanie Halliwell, senior designer
The Commonwealth of Australia Government through the Australia-Korea Foundation, part of the Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade, for their financial support through a grant in 2014
Korean Air, through the provision of reduced fare return air tickets to Seoul and an extended baggage allowance
Francois Saikally, for providing his cameraman skills and equipment to the project
Stacey Kim, for her transcription and translation skills for the Korean interviews
Who are our CollaboratorsWe have active and ongoing collaborations with the following:
Design and Arts Australia Online, we have a cross linkage agreement with them so their artist records will point to our interviews and our interviews will link to their biographical information for an artist.
http://www.daao.org.au
Do You Want to Donate or CollaborateIf you would like to make a donation to this project, please visit
http://www.cultconv.myevent.com. To collaborate with this important and exciting project, please contact
Dr. Bob Jansen, Adj. Associate Professor Yvonne Boag or Dr. Paul McGillick.
Copyright & LegalsThe content of this site, including video, audio and all images are used subject to specific copyright agreements with the various copyright holders.
We respect the copyright of others and we expect you to respect our copyright and the copyright of the various artists.
If you believe we have infringed your copyright, please contact Dr. Bob Jansen (email
bob.jansen@cultconv.com) outlining your concerns and we will make every effort to address your issues.