Arts Garden Ep. 10 — Jazz, Modernism & Making Meaning

Post-Fringe, the Arts Garden resets.

In Episode 10, we trace the threads of creativity across generations, forms, and philosophies, moving from Adelaide’s jazz lineage to the radical history of modernist art, and into the inner worlds of sound, voice, and meaning.

🎷 We’re joined in-studio by James Muller and Lyndon Gray of The Exhibits, ahead of their upcoming album launch. They reflect on collaboration, creative renewal, and building the next wave of jazz musicians through the Elder Conservatorium.

🎨 We revisit the legacy of Max Harris and the Angry Penguins movement with Samela Harris, exploring censorship, resistance, and the long arc of artistic defiance that still shapes Adelaide’s cultural identity today.

🎶 Spiritual author Alana Fairchild joins us to talk about music as regulation, voice as power, and how sound and ritual can help us navigate uncertainty in a rapidly shifting world.

🌏 Plus:

•  Stephanie Rowe about a global poetry movement redefining publishing norms 
•  Brand SA's partnership with The Mill supporting South Australian artists 
•  SALA Festival registrations open for 2026 

Mad March may end but the ecosystem doesn’t. What’s left is the deeper work: sustaining creativity, challenging systems, and finding meaning in the noise.

Transcript

SPEAKER_04 0:00

Well, welcome everyone to the Arts Garden for the first post-fringe Arts Garden. Second post-festival. The fringe goes on for a little bit longer than the festival, but we're all taking a bit of a collective sigh and a break as the festival season is over for the year. Thank you to Isaac for hosting Space Jams. And tonight we've got our first post-festival show. And we're looking forward to all the artists in Adelaide say once the fringe is over, that's not the end of the art scene. It's not the end of the music scene. It's not the end of the opportunity to see great things. And so in the studio now, we're going to be talking with Lyndon Gray and James Muller, two members of the Jazz Quartet, the exhibits who are going to be launching their second album very soon at the Festival Centre. And we'll provide all those details for the dates of the exhibit's album launch then. But until then, we're going to talk about the exhibits, how you guys got together and and so on now. So welcome, Lyndon and James. Thank you very much. Goodbye. And I should say both two names very that should be familiar to music lovers in Adelaide. Lyndon, you've been in the Baker Suite that I know we've got a lot of the Baker Suite in our 3D catalogue.

SPEAKER_05 1:23

I saw that up on the up on the screen.

SPEAKER_04 1:25

I did some preparation and found some Baker Suite and also the Audreys and then James Muller, who is widely known as Australia's best jazz guitarist. That's in all the m material. How do you feel about that, Monica James?

SPEAKER_06 1:39

I look, I wouldn't I wouldn't go along with that. I'm alright. I've been very fortunate to have a really diverse and enjoyable career in the jazz world in Australia. I lived in Sydney for close to 20 years. Moved out of Adelaide when I was 21, and I've been fortunate to play with some really amazing musicians both uh all over Australia and internationally as well.

SPEAKER_04 1:59

Fantastic. And I think I saw you at the guitar festival, not last year, but the year before you were playing with the name evades me at the moment, but he'd moved back from the UK and you played a few tracks with him. He now lives in the hills.

SPEAKER_06 2:13

Oh, Carl Orr. Yes, absolutely. And that was a great concert. That was good fun. And Carl, of course, is another one of those. He was born in England, but basically grew up in Adelaide. So that was really fun to play with him. I've known him for a long time.

SPEAKER_04 2:25

Fantastic. And Lyndon also Triptych is people know you from your music from there as well.

SPEAKER_05 2:30

Yeah, I hope so. Yeah. There's been a couple of groups in Adelaide who people do remember Triptych as one. Also, the New Cabal was another one. I had a residency at Laboem for pretty much ten years with that group. And yeah, these are longer-term groups which have had it's nice. People bring them up from time to time. You worry that you've been forgotten, but then people actually will find your record on Bandcamp or actually produce a CD and say, Yeah.

SPEAKER_04 2:54

Fantastic. But we were talking before we came on air about how you're both not only jazz musicians but working to create the next generation of jazz musicians at the Elder Conservatorium as well. Is that how the collaboration between the two of you met with the exhibits, or was there another how did you decide to together? It was definitely part of it.

SPEAKER_06 3:13

Lyndon and I had known each other for gee I'd at least 15 years, I'd say, before we started working at the uni together. But obviously being in close proximity to each other most days of the week has played a definite part in us getting together and talking about stuff we'd like to do. We I think we talked for a good few months before we did something about the sort of stuff we'd like to play. Yeah, yeah.

SPEAKER_05 3:37

Yeah, I will put it out there immediately that I as a young jazz musician I idolized James when I was seeing him coming back from Sydney, performing with his trio and things like that. It's been an absolute delight and joy to work with James on this project. And I think hopefully we've found some sort of middle ground between the two of us. And maybe it's been a bit of a nice project in that neither of us has felt like it's my project or yours, so we've been able to explore some sort of ideas that maybe we wouldn't have before, or maybe that freed us up to go in some areas that maybe, yeah, if it had my name stamped on it or yours specifically.

SPEAKER_04 4:12

Exactly. I agree, I totally agree with that. Yeah. Fantastic. And I uh when I was reading as well, there was some conversation that people were unhappy, James, that you hadn't released anything since 2018, and then there'd been a bit of a gap, and then 2025 and then 2026 album after album. So it's obviously been a fruitful partnership where you released an album last year and then another one following up straight away.

SPEAKER_06 4:37

Absolutely. I I lost my nerve a bit uh like around that period you're talking about after 2018. I guess I went through something of a uh midlife crisis with my music. Uh doing the recording with the exhibits was really a way back into the music scene for me. And yeah, as you say, I've released a couple of other things as well since that first uh exhibits record. So it's been great.

SPEAKER_05 4:58

So thank you, Lyndon, for I'm delighted if that's the case. I was also going to say, yeah, you also released that album with Ken Stubbs this year, which you're a big part of it as well. It's also really great that you've been out that we've been able to tour a bit more. It's felt that all coincided with what happened in 2020, where everyone went to ground and this has all felt like it's coming out of the ashes of COVID, etc. Yeah, absolutely.

SPEAKER_10 5:20

So how long have you both been working at the uni, at the concert con?

SPEAKER_06 5:23

I've been there for I started as a casual staff member in 2014 and then became a permanent staff member in 2016. So it's 10 years as a permanent staff member, I think. When then you started what? Mid-2019. Yes.

SPEAKER_05 5:38

But I was doing my PhD there. I finished that in 2018. I decided to do the numbers there. So I've been in and out of the academia circles there, but officially on staff from 2019.

SPEAKER_10 5:49

I imagine that's a really lovely balancing move after and there must come a point you get really sick of the nightclubs and get to know or no, I definitely know.

SPEAKER_06 6:00

I think that as I was saying a little while ago, just about the having a bit of a sort of crisis of sorts. Yeah, I was definitely a bit over the whole gigging thing. So it has been great to have another outlet teaching and just another sort of that having also regularity, like doing the same thing week in, week out after not knowing which what was going to happen each week for 20 something years or 30 years, whatever it was, has been really interesting, really great. I really like that regularity. Sure. Yeah.

SPEAKER_05 6:32

You did there is the thing at the back of your mind where you worry, are you just like relaxing into a sort of a more comfortable state? And then, you know, that sort of pressure creating diamonds situation when you're younger. It's but at the same time, it's academically. Sure, different pressure, different directions.

SPEAKER_04 6:48

But let's wait, no.

SPEAKER_10 6:49

It's a bit more humane in the con, I don't know.

SPEAKER_04 6:51

No, but also at the con, because at this performance that we haven't mentioned the date yet, it's going to be the 8th of May 8 and is celebrating International Jazz Day as well. But at the con, there's Mark Simeon Ferguson who has shown the way in many ways, got every cabaret festival. I'm seeing him up and performing and still creating and arranging with cabaret artists and things, and so really showing how you can balance that life.

SPEAKER_05 7:17

Super diverse as well. Mark will recently wrote string quartet arrangements. This piece that he's performing here, the jazz relay, is something that he's I've done in previous years. So he's very diverse. I think it was last night or the night before he was performing with his group Marmalade Circus slash trio, which has been happening for over 25 years. Mark is a fantastic energy for us and for the course.

SPEAKER_04 7:35

And you also get to be inspired and be in touch with the emerging artists as well. So you're going to be joined by the Danica L. Quartet, led by jazz vocalist Danica L. And what can you tell us about their work?

SPEAKER_05 7:46

Actually, here is the thing where we both do feel a bit old because if of course these people were in some form and other students of ours. But Danica is a fantastic singer. She occupies the sort of swing era style, but writing from a sort of modern perspective. And yeah, she's fantastic in the writes great swing tunes. She's in the Ella Fitzgerald zone, but with a sort of modern slant. But yeah, she's fantastic. So it'll be actually a really nice contrast to what we do. I think the whole evening is going to be quite diverse in a good way.

SPEAKER_04 8:14

Fantastic. And the new album isn't out yet, but we're going to hear a taste. Perhaps I think we agreed on three tracks that we're going to plug in a row from it, that people can get a bit of a taste to wet their appetite for attending on the 8th of May and also buying the album. What can you tell us about the sounds and the approach that you've taken to the album and in particular the tracks that we're going to play? Because we're going to open with Anthropologist or Ghost is the first one.

SPEAKER_05 8:42

Yeah, absolutely. I think first of all, I'd like to point out that the other two members of the band are Tom Noonan, the Auto Sachs player, who has been with us the whole time, and old friend of Jones's from Sydney, Tim Firth, on drums. The first album we had a great drummer by the name of Josh Baldwin, but he moved over to France. And so this is like the new, the newer version of the band. And yeah, I think this newer material, there's a little more I don't know, it's a little spikier or something. It's less our first album had a bit more, I would have said like acoustic jazz ambiance to it. And this has got a little a few more jagged edges to it.

SPEAKER_06 9:15

I think that's right. Yeah, we also had a different composing process for the first record. I remember we both said that we were going to write really simple short tunes for the first album, which sort of has not quite, but this new record, we didn't put that restriction on ourselves. I think there's more in it for a start. Do you would you agree with that? Not that the other one was it feels yeah.

SPEAKER_05 9:41

We certainly let that restriction go a little bit in certain ways. But I think it's balanced across the board.

SPEAKER_04 9:46

In certain ways, because I see a couple of tracks, sudden grumble, one minute forty-four, and then sudden crumble, thirty-six seconds. But you wait until you see how many notes we cram into that.

SPEAKER_05 9:55

That was very much by design in the idea of having yeah, especially jazz records can be maybe a little predictable if you have just a series of six-minute songs one after the other. But to have actually long tracks and short tracks, and yeah, I think we both yeah, the last track is a little in, you know, I became a musician as a high school student in the 90s. It was really common to do at the end of the track. So this is my little version of that. But the other tracks, we both contributed ones that are under Yeah, yours is three minutes long. And that's just yeah, I just like the different durations of shaping it in a different way.

SPEAKER_04 10:28

People can get along and celebrate International Jazz Day at the festival centre, and they can go get tickets now, get chance to see some top Adelaide jazz. Not just top Adelaide jazz. Australia's best Australia Australia's best uh as we like to say, but and I should say that because we've got the Elder Conservatorium, we've got Marriottville, we've got that pipeline here to go from high school to the Elder Conservatorium and really world-class ecosystem to get to the the top of jazz here as well. So to experience that, appreciate all that we have to offer here just before Cabaret Festival, and I know there's some good jazz coming to that as well. So thank you very much, Lyndon Gray and James Muller, for coming in and talking about the exhibits. We've been going to the Adelaide Festival and the festival centre's open again, and part of the reason it was closed, there's nice new seats, there's more places to sit down in the foyers and tables by the tyrants outside, and all these different opportunities. That was one of the things I always struggled with getting there, is you get there, and if you people had already staked out the few spots to sit, then you were just standing awkwardly before the show. So that's a very good improvement. They've got more places to sit inside, but also there's the opportunity to eat in so many different new ways there as well. I was getting there late for a performance, and now there's the opportunity to just get a snack, a salad, or a toasted sandwich and things like that.

SPEAKER_10 12:02

What is that place? I was looking for that.

SPEAKER_04 12:04

Oh, in the Dunstan Playhouse, there's a new little cafe there. It used to be a bar, I think. Yes, I've seen. And they've just got a toaster there, and it's just like a being able to when you're racing around from different places and you haven't had a chance to eat, and just being able to get a cheap toasted sandwich was a lifesaver. For the more up market, there's a restaurant there now called Angry Penguins, and the story for why it's become named, and well, it's been named Angry Pen Penguins, touches on so many elements of Australia, Australia's and Adelaide's arts history, because we've just been talking about the fringe and the festival, but very much there were pioneers before Don Dunstan in Adelaide that were pushing for modernist art movements, including Samula Harris's father, Max Harris. And so he founded, and we talk all about this. Samula, we're going to hear an interview from her in a second, but she talks all about how her father created a poetry journal called Angry Penguins and the consequences that had across our art scene. And so it was a fascinating interview I had with her last week. We didn't get a chance to play it then, but we're going to hear it now, and there's an opportunity to not only eat interesting food when you go in there, but check out some art, check out some other things that are going on in Angry Penguins as well. And so we're going to have a listen now to Samuel Harris and I chatting about this, and then we'll come back and play a couple more tracks after this. So a bit more music this week, but one more interview for you. Here's Samuel Harris. Excellent, we're in the Adelaide. Excellent, we're in the Adelaide festival season and the fringe season, and so often when this season gets talked about, quite rightly, honour is given to Don Dunstan and the the reforms that he brought in and the initiatives that he brought in. But from reading about Angry Penguins and your father, very much the movement began so much earlier, twenty years or more earlier, and so often politicians are just responding to movements rather than initiating them for themselves. Do you feel like with the opening of Angry Penguins there's an acknowledgement of the pivotal role that played and your father played in all that we come to enjoy now?

SPEAKER_09 14:23

I think the yet the creation of Angry Penguins as a landmark within the festival centre in the festival city is an extraordinary acknowledgement of my father, Max Harris, and indeed the rising of the movement of modernism in Australia. Max was uh actually acknowledged as the father of modernism in the Australian arts, and indeed he was on board for the first festival, he was on board with Angry Penguin way before that because there was such a great resistance in Australia for anything that wasn't traditionally Australian and colonial and of the sort of Anglo cultural background. And Mag was among those early people who were looking at Europe and the emergence of the modernist movement and publishing it in the nascent Angry Penguin magazines. It's all a very long and complicated story. This was during the war. So it's very much pre-dumped on the emergence of modernism, which is being acknowledged at the festival centre in creating The Angry Penguin. And the art that's on show there is the art that evolved from that early rust of the brave modernists who were fighting against the old conservatives, who just wanted to keep everything pastoral in English and not go out into the brave new world of surrealism and all that sort of very avant-garde newness. So that was my dad. He was on the edge of all that. And and he was, of course, a Dumpston senior in terms of years. But Dumpston was a great activist in his own right and getting everything up and running and defying again the conservatives to make art happen and things happen. So there there's a parallel there.

SPEAKER_04 16:28

Definitely, and history moves into cycles often as well, and we're in a time where again, more innovative or controversial modes of speaking in in the arts or in social debates more generally is arguably under threat, and we're not quite at a world war yet, but on near the cusp of it uh as well. And so it's a timely reminder as well about how when people speak about change and innovation, and controversially there will always be people that try to sabotage that as well, and it's important to to hold to your ideals.

SPEAKER_09 17:05

Absolutely, and that's how the the terrible earn malley triumph occurred because Max and the modernists of Angry Penguins, the magazine which emerged here out of Adelaide University with it followed a university paper or magazine called Phoenix. And when it died, Max and the other Angry Penguins were Paul Pfeiffer and Teddy Kerr. They were the three original Angry Penguins. They both died in the war. Max survived, and he wasn't the Angry Penguin. And he ended up going to Melbourne to to be adopted into the Heidi circle of modernists which were emerging with John Reed and Sunday Reed and Matt School and Tucker now. So they were my father was a very colourful character. He got lured to the Melbourne theme. Um where modernism was a little ahead of Adelaide, but they they took one look at what Maggie was doing with Angry Penguin and said, We'll have him. And so it came to pass that the Great Hoax occurred, which was the attack on modernism, which was the very affair and in which case Max was targeted with a conspiracy on a hoax poet created by a couple of young services who were bored in their barracks. But they created poetry with which they were trying to categorize the whole movement of border with non-sequitors and non-from they were picking up from various journals around them, and magazines around them, and whatever they had and that they created, they hated Henry Penguin, claiming that an understanding how they got married. And the other group of people wonderful and that's the real pivot of that story. One of the greatest history of the world, really. Because then Narry's hungry is really good. It was really good. And everybody was impressed with that. And it was published and I did special edition of every payment and Nelly. And then it was it was hard. Look at that, look at that. And it went on. And the conservative attacking the power tree. And Max was prosecuted for publishing the plane material. The power tree had very for example one of the power. And we're going to be not because we understood what happened. Um 20 years, 21 year old. Learn from the art gallery.

SPEAKER_04 22:06

Definitely. And just around the corner from our radio studio, there's the Earn Maui venue as well that's popped up taking its name. And they host quite a lot of arts events and things there as well. But beyond the painting that's hanging at the Angry Penguins, so many books, artists inspired by the whole affair, but also by Angry Penguins as well. And so it's an incident that's spawned even further creativity. And when you talk about the censoring of poets, we had the convener from the Friendly Street Poets into the studio a few weeks ago, and they talked about how poets are never censored when they read there. Even they had someone that would get up and read quite pornographic things, but no everyone was welcome no matter what they read, and that's the kind of freedom and world that we've created after Max went your father went through that fight to to have poets heard.

SPEAKER_09 22:58

Indeed, and it might be proceeded to renage. It's so wholesome and so fun. It's covering a whole new generation. It's very exciting. A movement which incredibly proud of the man behind the angry penguin card, which I adore. And I didn't know Angry Penguin. And also the marvellous examples of the art of a period which adorned toys around the vegetable centre now. It's extraordinary. I couldn't be more astonished and more delighted by by the emancipation and enlightenment that inherent in all of them.

SPEAKER_04 23:54

Yeah, and one of the things that I've been enjoying about the Adelaide Festival Centre since it's reopened as well, artists love gathering and having a drink before and after a show, and that that capacity, whether it be at Angry Penguins or anywhere in the festival centre now, it's so much easier to just get something to eat and hang around the centre and interact with other audience members and artists and things after the show. Previously it was often required to go elsewhere to eat. And so by creating these venues and outlets, it's an opportunity for more artists to connect and dream up new ideas and innovations instead of going off and dispersing.

SPEAKER_09 24:41

And the food that Alex Katz membership that got in that being Angry Penguin. I took three generations of her son and my granddaughter took a little head of a friend and had and we worked right across the menu in Angry Penguin. And we couldn't bought anything that we could. And I just thought of the penguins. We've needed that for a long time. We've needed that quality. We'd needed food we really want to eat. And then there was a snap around uh where the crystal doors come out. In a little flack plate, you can get a quick bright at interval if you want.

SPEAKER_04 25:23

No, I got a cheese and ham toasted sandwich before seeing some modern dance on Saturday, and all that money's going back into the centre and supporting hopefully supporting or inevitably supporting the arts instead of going elsewhere as well. And so it's another way of supporting the centre and funding the arts as well, making sure the money goes there instead of to somewhere on Heinley Street or Rundle Street or something like that.

SPEAKER_09 25:47

Yeah, indeed. Hallelujah. Kate Gold has come back to Adelaide and she has looked at what the death of Word needed because she knows it very well from the year before. And she has been incredibly brave in how much she has committed to vision. I mean the quality of that created contribution. We can be celebrated and we can be anyway. We've needed it for a while. But it's not all that marked. But oh my god, it can't be what it is.

SPEAKER_04 26:42

Yeah, definitely, and there's not enough recognition sometimes that food and cooking and being a chef is an art form as well, and that's very much the approach that's been taken with the menu as well. That it uh the the creativity and innovation and you know recognizing that it's a a culinary art.

SPEAKER_09 27:00

They all merge together and glorious celebration for it before or after. I prefer to eat a full although I can make it. It's a marvelous option instead of having to go up to food and then come back down. And that's it, you know. I will discovering for the first time when I will be up and in the incarnation of food around the festival center. But the way the windows look out towards the river and towards the the oval. There's a mirroring of some floor on the awning. Which is incredibly beautiful when you look out of the window stage, you see these other layers of aesthetic. So it's a really lovely place. So you don't have to just when you're having your pre-drink, you could just revel in the advantage and all the art on the wall.

SPEAKER_04 28:02

Very lucky, and so uh that's been open since the twenty-seventh of February, and people can check it out now or anytime they go to a show from now on at the Festival Centre. And so thank you very much, Samuel, for for sharing all that you've shared today, and uh look forward to spending many a night or afternoon at Angry Penguins from now on.

SPEAKER_09 28:24

But destination dining, you don't have to be going to a show, you can just go down there for a meal.

SPEAKER_04 28:29

That's a very important point, too, and it's a way of you bring the foodies in and then they might stay for a show as well, and connecting the two worlds together is a great thing as well. Fantastic. Thank you for making the time to talk about it today, and all the best with the rest of your evening.

SPEAKER_01 28:45

Thank you.

SPEAKER_04 28:46

And so that was a fascinating trip down memory lane and getting a bit of context about the history of our arts community in South Australia as well, and also a bit of advice on where it's heading next. So that had me hungry as well.

SPEAKER_10 29:03

Yeah, I wouldn't mind oysters next time I go to the festival. I'm gonna look for that.

SPEAKER_04 29:08

We're gonna have Bridget Alfred, the CEO of Sala, coming in to talk because registrations are open again. Fringe is over, but the next festival's in the planning. We've also got we're gonna talk about a poetry compilation that's gonna be launched at Future Juice. And then I did an interview with a spiritual author called Alana Fairchild, who's also a sound healer. They've got a new coffee table book out, so I'll bring that interview as well. But kicking us off, we've got Tim from The Mill, and we've also got Christian Eckhart from Brand SA, Tim Watts from The Mill, and we're talking about there's a partnership clearly with uh Brand SA and the Mill. What can you tell us about this in exciting innovation, Tim?

SPEAKER_03 29:52

Thanks, James. Thanks for having us on. Firstly, so this is a really exciting partnership for the Mill. We've got a new collaboration going with Brand South Australia, who's our first ever studio partner. So, for those of you out there who might not know a lot about the MIL, we're in the CBD, we're at 154 Angus Street, and we're a multi-arts organization. We've been around since 2014, and we have various things going on in our space, but we have 70 artists and small businesses who rent space with us. We offer subsidized studios and workspaces, and we're one of the largest studio precincts in South Australia. We also have studio residencies there for photographers and writers and visual artists and performing artists.

SPEAKER_10 30:36

We've had numerous artists come in on our show who've done fantastic residencies with the Mill and also traveled, done international residencies with the Mill sponsorship. Right, yeah. So it's a really vibrant art place, creative place in Adelaide.

SPEAKER_03 30:50

We send people outside of South Australia to spread the good word about the art that's being made here and occasionally overseas as well. But yeah, this partnership that we've got going with Brand South Australia, like I said, it's the first time. So all of our studio residents at the mill have their spaces subsidized. We think it's really important that people, artists, makers, small business, those in the creative industries, have good access to accessible space. They pay roughly about 65% of the actual running cost of the studios.

SPEAKER_10 31:23

That's fantastic. It's just because of Brand SA's sponsorship.

SPEAKER_03 31:26

This has got a lot to do with Brand SA's partnership.

SPEAKER_10 31:28

Well done, Brand SA's.

SPEAKER_03 31:30

Yeah, so we cover that gap with various things like philanthropy and sponsorships, but this is the first time that we've had an official studio partner, so we're really excited to welcome Brand SA's.

SPEAKER_10 31:38

Yeah, that's excellent. Artists are doing it hard. We need more artists supported in South Australia.

SPEAKER_04 31:44

But also, Christian, the South Australian brand is an arts brand. We are the festival state, and it's no-brainer. How did this partnership develop and what sense does it make for Brand SA? What was it a decision that you were very proud to make?

SPEAKER_07 31:58

Yeah, thanks so much, James. So we were incredibly proud to partner with the MIL. So Brand SA was actually brought back as an initiative of the government in 2022. And besides promoting South Australia and all the great reasons to live here, study, trade, invest in South Australia. We encourage people to buy local and support their community. One of the best ways that we could find to support our communities by supporting our artists and the work that the mill does is really so fantastic. And we're just playing a small role really in promoting one of the many great things about South Australia, which is our arts community. And through this partnership, we're really proud to support the work that the MIL does.

SPEAKER_04 32:38

And it is, whether it be having a place for the artists to set up at the mill, but also having these additional avenues for promoting work. So often we talk to artists when they come in on the show that their main focus is the creating of the art and all the things like the marketing and developing a space that where they can work and so many of those other things, they have to learn those along the way, but it's not their natural environment. And so any support that can be provided by both the venue and by Brand SA is so appreciated by them because it leaves that cognitive space for them to do the things that they're really wanting to do all day as well.

SPEAKER_03 33:16

Yeah, absolutely. That's one of the things that we hear a lot from artists is one of the benefits of having a studio somewhere like the MIL, which has a management team, and we have various programs that we run both for our studio residents and for other artists who come in and out, is that yeah, they can really focus in on the creating and the making, whether they're a sculptor or a photographer or a performing artist or somebody making ceramics, like whatever it could be, that we try and streamline the process as best we can. It's one bill once a month. That's really all you have to worry about in terms of your studio space. And there's lots of opportunities for getting to know your neighbors, to collaborate with other artists, to feel inspired and to feel motivated by seeing the work that other people are doing. And then through partnerships like the one we have with Brand South Australia, we're also trying to push some of that publicity that you were talking about, James, and getting people's names out there. We've got a couple of things coming up throughout the year, like a makers market later on, which will run from sort of October to December, which is again as part of this partnership. We'll be putting on a mini makers market at the mill. Lots of M's. But yeah, partnering with Brand South Australia to have something around that Christmas time when people are looking to support local industries and are looking to maybe discover their next favourite maker or designer that they can come to the mill and peruse some wares, a bit different from what we normally do in our galleries. These will be more focused around things that people can purchase and take home with them on the day.

SPEAKER_04 34:43

Definitely, and that's one of the things I know we've had the Bow Bird market on things as well. We're coming up to a holiday. It's probably not as relevant with Easter this weekend. There's not as many big market for chocolate. I know, but not many chocolate artists, though. But then buy South Australian chocolate. Chocolate is an art form, of course, as well. But whenever there's Mother's Day and Father's Day and Christmas and things like that, just getting people to go buy essa as a gift instead of going to the departments or even a supermarket to buy chocolates or just those things, just getting people to think, okay, I'm going to create these times in the year where I'm going to support artists with my gift buying is a very powerful way to change spending habits as well.

SPEAKER_07 35:28

Yeah, that's right. And we absolutely use our channels, our social media channels through Brand SA to really take advantage of those moments as well. So it was really just a great opportunity to leverage the Christmas kind of period where people are buying gifts. And again, just another way to bring a bit of focus on local artists and the amazing things that they make. And I think another great initiative that we're working on with Tim and the team is we're working with an artist on a particular commission, and we're hoping that artists will give their interpretation of South Australia when we're at our very best. Watch this space and see how that develops. Actually, Kristen, I'm curious, where did Brand SA start? So it was initially launched in 2013 and closed down for a little while and then came back again in a slightly different form.

SPEAKER_10 36:16

Because the reason I ask, because I think this is intriguing to me, because in the past I can imagine Brand SA was all about trying to promote the very underrated at the time, South Australia. But it's interesting that situation has changed now. How how that then positions Brand SA. So it sounds like you've got this new 100%.

SPEAKER_07 36:37

Yeah, absolutely. There's a real momentum. I think a lot of us are feeling it in this state at the moment. A lot of eyes on South Australia. You know, what people are saying is that South Australia has what the world is looking for in a world that's increasingly chaotic. Where would you else would you want to be really than South Australia? So we're really trying to pick up that great momentum by supporting local, supporting our community, and yeah, getting as many people behind our state as we can.

SPEAKER_04 37:03

People coming here for gather around and they can go see some football and then buy some art. We don't want to generalize and say people that go to the football aren't going to be interested in buying art. They could be buying local, less transport cost, less petrol. Everything's more cost effective if it doesn't have to travel as far as well. So that's another good thing as well. But with these markets, I know the mill is such a fantastic event space, and you've got the the where will the market be taking place? In the gallery, or have you got the logistics of that planned out yet?

SPEAKER_03 37:33

Yeah, so the market's going to be front and centre, street facing. We're going to be doing it in our FOIA sort of project space. So it will run alongside two visual arts exhibitions. So gallery one and gallery two are both programmed during that period, and then we'll have this as a supplementary offering that people who are coming to the mill for any reason, whether it's to see the exhibitions or part of the performing arts program that we have, jumping on one of our studio tours.

SPEAKER_04 37:58

I was going to say, yeah, because you've got so many residents there as well. Would people the residents be working away when people come around and see them in action and things at the market? Or that's the hope.

SPEAKER_03 38:07

So yeah, we have over 70 different artists, makers, creative businesses that operate out of the mill. So we run studio tours every fortnight, which are free for the general public. They run on alternating Tuesday mornings and Friday afternoons every fortnight. People can jump on our website, book in and see what those are about. So yeah, we're hoping that with this market, it gives an opportunity for maybe people to come in, find an artwork or a product that they're particularly drawn to, and then have the opportunity to actually go and meet the person who made it and potentially even stand in the space where it was made in that studio. And we feel like that's something really important that people get a real genuine connection to where their money is going, knowing that it's staying in the state is really important and that there is no middleman. It goes straight to the creator.

SPEAKER_04 38:54

Fantastic. And just finally you talk about exhibitions. And I know I I had an invitation, but I didn't didn't make it out on Friday night. But you've got an exhibition. I'll get it the details up as well. But you've got an exhibition that opened on the 27th of March at the mill as well. And so people can go in just because you've missed the opening, it doesn't mean you've missed your opportunity to go and see this exhibition by Tony Hassan, the Sea Is Talking. Or is that one's open, yeah, on Friday, and then that's running until the 15th of May. Have you checked that out loud?

SPEAKER_03 39:30

Yeah, I was actually on leave from work last week, so today was my first day back, and the wallpaper's can completely change since I left. One exhibition's been bumped out, and the new one's been bumped in. So we've got Tony Hassan's exhibition, and then we've also got Anthea, who is one of our resident artists. Anthea Jones has been working in painting mainly and has really gone to town on this exhibition. We've got she's done dressmaking, she's done some model making. It's a really incredible exhibition, and the two of them side by side, I think, are really complimentary. We're open Monday to Friday, 10 to 4. Recommend that you jump on our website for a bit of information about both of those exhibitions and the other offerings that we have coming up. And we'd love to get you to come down and pay us a visit at some stage.

SPEAKER_04 40:14

Fantastic. So that's Anthony, Anthea Jones. We think differently. And I've heard there's some rotating skeletons and all sorts of things to see there. So definitely go in and check that out. And then also check out potentially the 70 other artists there on a studio tour and later on with the market as well. So you can follow the mill on all the social media to keep up to date with that, but also follow brand South Australia as well. And you can see it on both channels or one of them. Thank you very much, Kristen and Tim, for coming in and sharing all that with us.

SPEAKER_07 40:44

Pleasure. Thanks so much.

SPEAKER_04 40:45

Amazing. Thanks for having us. Here on 3D Radio and the Arts Guard. We've welcomed Bridget Alfred in, CEO of Sala. So welcome back into the studio.

SPEAKER_02 40:55

Thank you. I love you to be here.

SPEAKER_04 40:57

It's it's always a reminder the fringe is over, and then we just keep rolling. And I know the Cabaret Festival lineups coming out on Wednesday, and Salah registrations are open. It's going to be running from the 1st until the 31st of August. But you don't have to have your work done yet. You can still register. And then I've spoken to so many artists, whether it be I've registered for a fringe show, and I haven't written the show yet, but they've made that commitment, and then that forces them to create. I bet you hear that from artists every year as well.

SPEAKER_02 41:26

Yeah, you need a little bit of momentum sometimes and a deadline.

SPEAKER_04 41:30

And you don't even need to have a venue lined up as well, because there's so many different ways to be connected to venues through the Salah website as well.

SPEAKER_02 41:38

We do have to have a venue lined up to actually register, but we have our Salah website.

SPEAKER_04 41:43

Notice pool. That's what I was thinking, where you can you don't need to have it connected before you go to the Salah website. You can get assistance because that can be the other barrier.

SPEAKER_02 41:52

Yeah. Hey, jump on and have a look. That has the venues that put their name on the notice board are open and looking for artists, and they've got their contact details there. And if it then you can give them a call and send them an email and tee up a meeting. But the other thing the artist should have a look at is our thank you page. We've got a thank you page for all of the venues close to 700 that were involved last year in 25. And it's our way of saying thank you to the venues, links through to their businesses, gives them a little bit of passive publicity. But it's also a really good way for artists to see who was active last year, they might be active again this year, and the types of venues that are active because sometimes you just need to think about oh, that cafe. Oh, I know another one.

SPEAKER_04 42:37

Yeah, no, because I think one of our first interviews, Sala really every year reimagines and broadens the idea of what a space could be. I think I remember making jokes about the there was an exhibition in a toilet and you could a great one a few years ago. And but Bronwyn, you've seen venues advertising as well in your travels.

SPEAKER_10 42:57

Well, I was just gonna say I've enjoyed in Sala some of the country drives. You know, when you go through and there's a whole circuit in a particular valley, or and then you you can follow the maps and find all the different artists. But one thing I noticed, we eagerly went to see a supermarket that was a venue.

SPEAKER_02 43:14

That's Foodland.

SPEAKER_10 43:15

And I think it it's underexploited as yet.

SPEAKER_02 43:18

Yeah, and foodlands are one of our partners, they're fantastic. They have 97 venues across the state, they're a distribution partner, so people can get our programs at the Foodland store. But I think they had close to 40 of those 97 involved last year as exhibition spaces, and it's a fantastic way to do it because community artists will go and talk to their local food land and they put this exhibition together. They really get behind them. It's a good outcome.

SPEAKER_10 43:47

I'm really greedy to hear because I'm really pleased to hear that. Because the one we went to, we couldn't find the art. It was like, where is it? Where is it? Really high up the walls, but I'm glad to hear that was just an anomaly.

SPEAKER_02 44:01

They have to keep it out of the way of little little sticky fingered children.

SPEAKER_04 44:04

I remember I saw the Ross Hannaf the Hannaford exhibition at Isla last year and they had some very realistic apples that they'd painted. And so you might have just walked past the apples, Brumwin, and they were painted apples, but you just didn't know because they were like you just thought that would be intriguing, wouldn't it?

SPEAKER_10 44:19

Enchanting. I would pay a bit extra for that, doesn't it?

SPEAKER_04 44:21

You could have, yeah, you could have sculptures and things like that.

SPEAKER_10 44:25

Buses and trains. They do that in London, don't they? They have exhibitions on the train stations, on the buses.

SPEAKER_04 44:31

But also the stoby pole art, I didn't realise how.

SPEAKER_02 44:34

That's becoming a thing, isn't it? Yeah. And we have had um stone-poles registered quite regularly, actually, in the sala as exhibitions, single or collective, a street scale of stoby poles.

SPEAKER_04 44:47

That'd be a great community activity. The street, everyone paints their own stoby pole.

SPEAKER_02 44:52

Oh, they do that, don't they? I thought that was street workshopping. There are a number of communities that do that. Down Sheppertill Road are a series of painted painted uh stoby poles that have been a part of a community action. And there's a fantastic Bowden Brompton has got a uh an area where an artist who lives in the area is a mosaic she's a mosaic artist and she has mosaic creations of all of these. I think it was the 10th anniversary last year that we went to. Yeah, she's been doing a fantastic job, and the whole community gets behind her and brings her broken crockery and broken tiles that she then puts to good use.

SPEAKER_04 45:35

Oh, I've just my my street's not very cultured, Bromwin. So it'll be I'd have to I'd have to start doing the groundwork this year. Oh, you haven't seen me paint it. Yeah, but and as you say, distribution partners. We just had the Mill and Brand S. A. talking about getting the word out about your art, and that's one of the beautiful things about Sala, all the different ways, whether it be in the guide or on the website and things like that, getting people to see your art is sometimes the biggest challenge. And then having the platforming of Salah is the wonderful thing about it.

SPEAKER_02 46:03

Activates this state. So registrations are open until May the 6th this year. April 8th, we've got early bird pricing is open until April 8th. I would get your skates on.

SPEAKER_04 46:15

You wouldn't want to do the oh, I'm gonna register and then create the art and then leave the May the 6th. That might not be you might be really scrambling to create the work there. But don't tell artists what to do, is what I should say.

SPEAKER_10 46:33

Yes, but let them know where the discounts are available.

SPEAKER_04 46:36

Oh no, exactly. But also you want to put the time into it because there's awards and opportunities as well. That there's so many ranging from the Country Arts Breaking Ground Award, which is the 10,000, but all the way uh and the Salah and Lights Award supported by Novotech, that's a value to 10,000 as well. There's some great opportunities to get your work recognised. And I think we've said in the past that those awards pay for your next creation as well. That it gives you the time and the recognition to go, oh I'm gonna create something else now.

SPEAKER_02 47:07

There are some really and the awards, the range of awards are on the website. So the website's a really good resource for people to jump onto and people can read what the awards are supporting, because there are some awards that support emerging artists, so the City Rural Awards, and there are some awards that support contemporary artists, the advertiser. And there are some awards that are more general, like the Foodland Novotech Silar and Lights project that you talked about. So that's Foodland contributes two and a half thousand dollars in cash and the same amount in an in-store credit card, which is hugely valuable to artists, and Novotech up to two well, more than ten thousand dollars in kind support for a large-scale projection on a wall in the next cellar in the middle of the city.

SPEAKER_04 47:54

So fantastic. And not only are there awards for emerging artists, but also there's a city of only active aging award for artists over the age of 60. And often we hear that as well that I'm beyond emerging, I don't qualify for this kind of award. And so having that spread of awards and inspiring people to take up the art at any time, and as they say, in the name of the award, active aging award, keeping the brain fresh and things like that, and encouraging that kind of pursuit is such a wonderful thing as well.

SPEAKER_02 48:23

James, and the really brilliant artists are a part of that award, unless you're really hugely supportive of the artists in the area. You don't have to be in the area to be applying for that award. The City of Adelaide Award is another really fantastic one, and you need to be exhibiting within the City of Adelaide, North Adelaide boundaries for that particular award.

SPEAKER_10 48:43

Alongside the open call, is the exhibition team doing things like arranging particular type of exhibitions?

SPEAKER_02 48:52

We run a range of projects. Some of those projects are bedded down, and some of those projects are in the process of being bedded down. And we work with a number of different partners to provide opportunities for artists. For instance, Foodland again, they put on three Foodland art bags each year. So we can bring on three different artists, and this year we've got Lisa Kahn, Louise Bedaz, and Henry Cockington, and their artwork will be featured on the artists they're sold in store. They're sell out. So quickly. They're highly collected. So shopping bags. Shopping bags. Oh, yeah, shopping bags. Yeah, absolutely gorgeous. Yes. And then we have another fabulous partnership with Skoda, who wrap cars in art. And that's a SCODA and VisualCom support that. So we've got our funeral for our petrol cars. They're bringing the electrics in. And Alison Parsons is one of the artists on the SCOTA cars, and Donovan Christie this year. So we're looking forward to seeing them.

SPEAKER_04 49:55

And there's the opportunity every year to be on the poster as well, is uh that every year a feature artist.

SPEAKER_02 50:02

So that is the feature artist is the artist that is awarded the monograph that's supported by DPC and Wakeful Press. And this year we've got Troy Anthony Bayless, he's a fabulous artist, very colourful. So he's a Joan, I hope I'm saying it correctly, from the Northern Territory man with Irish ancestry as well. And his artwork plays plays around with the idea of queerness and challenging and unsettling the ways that we think about Aboriginality in a world of colour and textiles, and he has a performance element to some of his work as well. So he's a really interesting artist, and his work is going to be featured on the poster and the programme.

SPEAKER_04 50:50

Which is launching, I think, on the 22nd of April.

SPEAKER_02 50:53

22nd of April, the poster is, yes.

SPEAKER_04 50:56

Yeah, yeah.

SPEAKER_02 50:57

A little bit longer for the programme.

SPEAKER_04 50:58

No, and uh they're an artist that likes being uh colourful with their hair as well, which I'm envious of and no hair and things.

SPEAKER_02 51:04

But uh So how long do people have again till April 8th to register? April eight pricing, and then May the 6th for the standard pricing, which is not that much more than every little bit counts. And I would say also jump on the website and see who if your council has a rebate. Lots of councils support their citizens with rebates. So that helps pay for a portion of the registration price.

SPEAKER_04 51:29

No, local council councils getting familiar with grant opportunities and rebates that local councils are offer is a very good thing to do, whether it be pitching an idea for an event or an exhibition using one of their venues and things like that. Local councils are always very there's opportunities there that are lurking that it's good to become aware of. And uh Preachett, thank you for sharing all the opportunities that are being offered by Salah this year. And we look forward to as with every year having artists that are part of the festival on once the program is out and things like that as well.

SPEAKER_02 52:03

Fantastic.

SPEAKER_04 52:04

And of course, people can go to uhsalafestival.com to find out more or follow on Facebook, Instagram, X as well, or Twitter. So all of those things are still there as well. Bridget Alfred, CEO of Salah. The Arts Garden with James and Bronwyn. Now, Bronwyn, you were talking about uh on the weekend you're going to Ace Open to see an exhibition as well.

SPEAKER_10 52:28

Yes, the Cumneck Exp exhibition, which is now I heard about this in relation to the community that's from or got ties to High March Island. That's being revisited by Country SA. They're doing a dramatisation of the stories that are relevant to High March Island and why it's sacred for the people from there. It ties to the Seven Sisters dreaming, which I didn't realise we had a dreaming relevant to the Seven Sisters in South Australia, but we do. And it's tied to High March Island. So I've been wanting to see that exhibition at eight. I believe there's a range of artists exhibiting, but it was through that connection that I heard about it. And it's finishing this Saturday. But the there's a curator tour, a pre-curator tour from 12 to 2. So if you have been interested in that exhibition and you've missed it and you're in town this Easter, that's your final and last opportunity. And it should be really interesting with the curators explaining it.

SPEAKER_04 53:28

No, definitely a very good opportunity to go and uh long weekend, go along and see that excellence. I might send that to my group chat at work as well. There might be some people interested in going along and hearing all about that. A spiritual author, a musician, a meditation guider. I don't know if that's what you're called. They they create guided meditations as well. They've written over 70 different works, and they've got a new book out called Incantations and Divinations. A grimoire of goodness and grace is their latest book.

SPEAKER_10 54:07

But a what's he of grimness and grace? A grimoire.

SPEAKER_04 54:10

A grimoire.

SPEAKER_10 54:11

What a great word. A grimoire. I love it. Grimoire.

SPEAKER_04 54:15

I think that's how you pronounce it. It's like a memoir, but it's grim, maybe. I don't know.

SPEAKER_10 54:19

Interesting phrase, yeah.

SPEAKER_04 54:20

But they had a very interesting journey that I won't repeat here because I talked to them about it as well. Into this world that they've created. Yeah. It's a very interesting chat. We talk about often on the show about the different functions of art and artistic creation and singing, beyond just it being an art form and a career, it's also a very therapeutic and healing thing as well. And yeah, Alana Fairchild is they've got a very big following. They're creating a concert that we talk about using the works of Rumi, the poet Rumi, and adding music to that. They're working with a Grammy Award-winning artist on that process. And so hopefully that comes to Adelaide as I talk to them about during it as well. But yeah, we're going to hear this chat that I recorded with them now on 3D radio. Your journey. Alright. Excellent. Yeah, no, and and so I was looking through uh and reading some interviews about your journey, and uh I saw similar to me, you studied law initially, and then then that wasn't a very pleasant experience as as similar to me as well. But I was thinking about that as the the you know study of the law and the systems of law in our society are are one way of arriving at or you know, of us constructing a version of truth or a version of reality, and you know, it's there's the level of comfort there of okay, the truth is whatever's in the statute books or the law books or or whatever, but we're going through a time at the moment where a lot of our institutions and a lot of our a lot of uncertainty. Um and you know, your work very much helps people work through that uncertainty and and develop resilience in such uncertain times like we've got.

SPEAKER_08 56:13

Yes, and I think that's important, the idea of resilience rather than just trying to pin it on something else and find that fixity or that sense of external source of truth, which is really hard because we want to do it. We want to know that there's something in the world around us that we can rely on. And I I think what's sort of happening in the world today, and for many of us on an individual level, it's that we're witnessing uh in society is this sense that we have to find something that's steady within that will support us regardless of what is happening around us, and we feel like we can't necessarily control it, or what is happening doesn't necessarily seem to be serving everyone, but we would want it to serve and benefit. You know, it can be quite challenging to feel. But we're not losing despair or becoming hosteless or overwhelmed with fear or or doubt or anxiety and uncertainty in the face of all the changes and fluctuation.

SPEAKER_04 57:09

Definitely. And I was reading as well that, you know, along with the the study of the law, it seems like uh with your work in including sound healing as well as so many other things, and I know you're a musician as well. Was music always there from the start or early on? And was that there throughout the whole journey? Was that something that you went back to?

SPEAKER_08 57:32

Yeah, it is. And there's something about it too. I think there's two aspects to it that it's so powerfully universal. It's probably one of the most universal languages, maybe it's only second to match, that is a language that people can connect with. And there's that accessibility research. And I think when we are mindful about what we consume, whether it's media or music or whatever it might be, there is this possibility in the truly accessible way of utilizing music as a kind of regulatory pastime. You know? So it's not only something that's enjoyable or interesting, but we can notice the effect that it has on our mood, on our energy, and actually work with that and support a mechanism and also a form of expression because artists are expressing their journey and their truth, and there's often their sense of resonance and someone gives voice to something. You might think, you know, I've been feeling that it didn't quite know how to say it. And I think that's the other aspect we can even get can bypass and what is the um mental or um ideas of logic that can get in the way when we're trying to make sense of something and just drop us into what we feel and what our set of truth is and and being able to attune to something that's deeper than the idea of war that we talked about earlier, where everything has its place and everything happens in a certain way. Maybe it would be more shifting about chocolate like that, maybe in some way in a garage, but it doesn't really feel like it on earth, it's more like a you know, um circus. A lot of the time I think so there's something about having tools that can be enjoyable but have positive effects at the same time. And like for me at least did want to go.

SPEAKER_04 59:08

Definitely. And you talk there about it uh, you know, being a universal language. And I've spoken to a few uh musicians and artists about this that I was reading a book, I think, last year that had the theory that music was the first language and then speech evolved, and you know, uh all the logic and rationality and all the things that we use, speech and the written words, you know, they came afterwards. But if music was the first language, then that must have been the most important. We we developed that first, that must have been the most important, and communicating something that can't be explained in words, and as you say now we've reduced it to entertainment or you only sing if you're good or you you can make money from it, and then that's cutting so many people off from something that was so foundational.

SPEAKER_08 1:00:01

I think that's really powerful what you've just said, and that's something about the the owning of your voice and it not having to be classically trained or whatever, just your voice and to be able to make sound and sometimes being to the right with sound healing to perform sort of more traditional musical space, but I also do sound healing work. And there's something about just utilizing the voice with an intention to express something, a feeling or a quality or an energy. And it it regulates your nervous system, you know, there's connections between vocalizing and table tone. I did uh the vagus system that I get to know, which is helpful for regulating the nervous system. So there's something about permission to speak. Especially, I kind of like the idea that you might not be the greatest musician ever and you give yourself or musician at all, and you give yourself permission to I do car karaoke, you know, whatever it is, but you you give yourself permission to make the sound or to express what you're feeling. And I love it because it just if you sound incredible, then everyone's gonna be like, Well, you should be singing all the time, and everyone's gonna want to listen to you. But you don't necessarily have that, but something beautiful in the ambience about Okay, I might not talk to my neighbours, but I'm like close the windows because I'm still failing to give myself permission to actually make the sound and it frees up the voice and then do that on a physical level to really feel it works on the energy level. Like Buddhist traditions teach that voice and energy are saying, So then we're expressing our sounds or moving our voice, getting it singing or vocalizing or whatever it might be, they're expensive and legendating our energy or kind of recalibrating ourselves because we are connected to things. You know, sounds have an effect on us. You hear something and it jumps you, you kind of say it, you it it forces a reaction in your being. So it's not hard to see the connection between sound and how we live in our body. And we can play with that. You know, you don't have to be you know, particularly expert to do it. It's our natural birth, like you'd say, a kind of Tran Audial and natural original language.

SPEAKER_04 1:02:10

Definitely. And you've got your new book that's come out, uh Incantations and Divinations as well, which explores ritual and intuition and personal empowerment and and singing or or or chanting or incantations or whatever. It can be a a daily ritual that helps us tap into what's going on inside our body, and you know, uh even with the personal empowerment, it's something that, you know, no matter what's happening in the world, I can do this for myself each day as well. Can you tell us a little bit about the book and how it can be used by people?

SPEAKER_08 1:02:46

Yeah, I mean, I wrote it just so it's kind of like a a spellbook figure, just like you can look at the spell, they're poets, really. But I call them incantation because they've got like a a positive energy and a spiritual aspect to it. So anyone could kind of open up the book and say it's random, or I really feel drawn to this, or whatever it is, and just speak it. And through saying things that are affirmations, that are deep and they're poetic, that can make you to populate spiritual tradition without requiring any doctrine or anything like that. And you can just speak it. You're actually putting this kind of energy, this vibration, this literal sound, into your field, into your space, into your body, into yourself. And there's something about it, you know, all the religious traditions get out of the world into it into Christianity, really, just to give a bit of, you know, the breadth of diversity there. But they talk about the beginning being the sound or the voice. So it's this notion that what we speak about, we bring about or we create. And I think, you know, when there's so much happening in the world and there's so many voices in the media, social media, all the different things that we're exposed to, sometimes we may feel silenced like we're taking all the stuff in. But how amazing to think that in a simple way that feels maybe pleasurable or joyful or self-empowering. But what you think, even in the privacy of your home, even if no one else hears you physically at that moment, you're putting some energy not only into your space and your body, but into the world because you're all connected and sound travel in the Red Sea. It's kind of like that chaos theory of the butterfly wings flapping somewhere and something else happens, you know, a storm happened somewhere else. It's this idea that we can actually be putting into the world the energy that we want to see, and we can use the creative function of the point. Even while we're just thinking, hey, I just want to say something that makes me feel better than the news that's being rehashed at the moment. Yeah, you know, I want to take control over how I show up in my life today, what my energy's like for the people that I love and the people that I encounter. So there's something around that empowerment and giving people a measure to do it. And it feels kind of cool for the itchy and it's fun. And it's not kind of um something you have to jump through hooch to do. Pick up the book, open it, read it, you might go, that's cool, but it's a bit strange.

SPEAKER_04 1:05:13

And I think sure Definitely, and I think there's something to be said because I've I've I've gone down every uh pathway almost myself, and um there's something to be said for just because we don't know how something's working that's not a reason not to do it as well, because you know, I've been reading about consciousness and and how we're still consciousness is still such a mystery uh to all of us, and you know, the theories that it are out there that are you know being spoken about now that maybe consciousness doesn't come from the brain, but our brains evolved to get closer to consciousness, a universal universal consciousness, to become a receptor for it, for example, and you know, that's one theory that's out there, for example, but even if it's just Just relaxing the body and relaxing the vagal nerve and or acting on our subconscious level or whatever it is. It's just the daily practice and and also the hope there as well. And and also the kind of the faith that there's things that are out there that are beyond our knowing as well.

SPEAKER_08 1:06:21

Absolutely. And what I love about that kind of open-natured mind is you can just try it. Why not? If it's five minutes and you do it a few times a week and you think just try it. I always say to people, just see it like an experiment. If it works for you, if it works for you and you feel better doing it, that seems quite good. And then what I've noticed is that when you find the thing and you're like, yeah, I'm kind of into this. It's this beautiful ecosystem. It's interesting to me the way energy and consciousness work on Earth. Like it is a kind of like attracts. And so that can work in a negative sense when you start to get kind of negatively focused on certain things, and then you seem to sing it everywhere, and it's kind of it builds out, and you just start noticing all of that stuff, and it starts to affect you. How you stand, how you sleep, you know, it gets into your being. But it also happens in the other way, the positive way, where you start to do something when then suddenly you become more aware of the world around you in a different way. You start to see the beauty of nature, you start to notice the small but kind, maybe sometimes even heroic things that human beings do, and you start to shift your mindset and your energy. And then you become like more masterful or more aware of how you're working with this incredible being that we all are. We have this mind and we have this study and this energy and this awareness. It's kind of incredible what we are. I think because you're in it and we're living it, it's not always easy to kind of recognize the incredible complexity and creativity and beauty and uniqueness of human beings. You know, there's a lot of anti-human sentiments out in the world. And I I think sometimes that's just we've got negatively mesmerized by all of the rubbish and we've forgotten about the good stuff. And it's just we need people who want to connect with that goodness and that light and that creativity and do something that consciously for their own joyfulness and their own peace of mind. But it it helps lift. I really believe it helps to lift the collectors to think about how we feel when we see someone walking down the street could be a complete stranger and go and talk to them. And it can like lift you and you just that goodwill between people to be small things and it's so powerful.

SPEAKER_04 1:08:47

Definitely, and you what you've been putting out into the world has, you know, reached such an audience with 70 published works and meditations and albums and all all those sorts of things as well. So what you're putting out there is clearly resonating with people as well, because finally, you know, we talked about your uh your music and uh and I've been told uh and sent through some of your recordings that we'll play on the show as well, working with you know, we talked about you don't need to be a good singer or a good musician to sing, but you have worked with Grammy Award winners and things like that as well. Can you tell us a little bit about what you're currently doing with your music?

SPEAKER_08 1:09:26

Yes, yeah. I am I've put together a new album that it's just come out recently, and I'm working on a new show to begin to ring it more extensively. And so that's based on the poetry of CP Misting Roomy. And I found it interesting that I was working on that music and really feeling when I produce it as well, sets you know, there's something about beats that feel spiritual. Like they work on a bunch of different music, and although I spiritually among something about beats that really felt like magic. And you know, when it's happening, it it's kind of not just you know, there's that creative fire that's there. Um and that's what was coming through. And I just we're working on the album, and then all of these things are happening politically around the Middle Ages and um with Iran, and I thought it and that the language that Rumi writes in is largely Persian. I mean he writes in other languages that are the Greek, Turkish. I think it's yeah, um, but mostly it's in Persian. So Barry speaks kind of synchronicity, and I felt that within with his work, he he's considered one of the most loved poets in uh in America. I think he's like the best-selling poet in America, or one of the guys. But there's something weird that speaks through his work, and uh one of the things about him that I really loved and that I wanted to bring into an album giving this eastern style of this different perspective through poetry that somehow speaks universally. Like he had people at his scenario that were Christian and um Jewish and Oxland as well. Like they're all there because they could all recognize the deep the truth of being human and learning to surrender and three and the difficult things and see it as part of my journey. Like one of his poems was called The Guest House. And he said, She's gonna show up today to get happiness, with it, sadness, and just let them all come in. And it's true, they're all guests. So they can't be um very kind and very powerful about his work. You know, just putting it together with his music, and I'm writing the show about it. I'm really wanting to take people into the mystery because one of the things really helps with is dealing with grief and loss and confusion and the things that happen in our lives that feel profoundly unfair or even devastating. And sometimes it's in our worst fear. The thing that we absolutely don't want to happen. Someone shapes on us, or someone breaks down hearts, or we lose our someone cherished through death, or whatever it might be, but the thing that really shapes it to the core and makes it hard to keep faith in our ability to above and being here and accept and engage life. So it speaks to that. And I thought, okay, I want to combine that with the universal power of music where people can just drop into it. And I I've done one show already on just um building it out the tour. But the feedback that I had from that is people felt they could relate to the story. So I would tell a little story about each poem and people singing the song, and it helped them kind of then digest the music, and the music made it easier to take in that spiritual teaching rather than it be maybe a bit dry, and people just speaking about things. So there's something in that that I think entertainment gets a bit of a bad about, and sometimes it's it mindless, and sometimes it's not so great, but other times I think it can be a way to few an hour to play, and that's a speech that's typically very creative. We let God the fixed, you know, critical mind and drop into a space where we consider possibilities. And I know for me that's where most creative ideas come from, and I'm kind of just sucked in my mind and opened. And then I think, oh, what about this? Never thought about that before. And everything kind of changes shape.

SPEAKER_04 1:13:16

Fantastic. Well, yeah, that unifying message uh within uh Rumi and the unifying power of music and arts and entertainment is uh definitely a message that needs to be heard at the moment, and we look forward to you know bringing that on tour, uh including Adelaide hopefully as well. Fantastic. But until until you two are here, people can get a copy of the book Incantations and Divinations and access all your material online as well. Uh thank you very much, Alana, for making the time to talk to us uh about this powerful message today.

SPEAKER_08 1:13:55

I'm at the pressure, James. Thank you.

SPEAKER_04 1:13:58

So that was Alana Fairchild, and so if you liked what you heard there, her new book has been released, Incantations and Divinations, and yeah, it was very fascinating to talk to her, particularly at a time that we're dealing with in the world. We're gonna hear now from Yeah, it's almost the end of the show, but next week it's Easter Monday, but we're still gonna be here, and we're gonna have Sand Dragon, local artist, into the studio. They played WOMAD this year, so we're gonna talk to them. Uh, we've got a visual artist who's just come back from Berlin and they're gonna be doing an exhibition in April, Grace Harper, so they're gonna come into the studio and also recording a interview with Dean Newcomb, who's part of the ASO's upcoming production, so I'm gonna do that interview, and also the Palestinian Film Festival is coming up, and they've got a great film that I think Bramw and you're interested in seeing as well that's gonna be coming here soon. So that's all gonna be on Easter Monday next week. But this was a few weeks, it was in the middle of fringe, but poet and publisher Stephanie Rowe came into the studio and talked about the launch of The World in Our Words 2, which is a poetry anthology with langu poets from all around the world in with poems from all around. Such a heartfelt creative person, and this is a really exciting Leon that has previously been on the Arts Garden that we both know is doing some work, and he was in the studio when I did this interview with Stephanie as well. He's helped hook them up with the crew at Future Juice, which is a renewed Adelaide gallery and venue space, and so they're gonna have their anthology launch on the 12th of April at 1 p.m. They've created a social media platform where there's at least 4,000 people on there. So it's a platform for poets to get their words out there and a very innovative approach to what they're doing as well. I think you'll enjoy this chat that I had with them. You'll be going along Bromwan to the launch of the Anthology. Excellent. Yeah, thank you again for joining us on the Arts Garden. We're gonna hear, as I say, from Stephanie Rowe now. Stay tuned for the hoot hoot after that.

SPEAKER_10 1:16:17

And happy Easter, everyone!

SPEAKER_04 1:16:18

Happy Easter, eat extra. That's your thing, but if it's not, if you celebrate the pagan aspect of Easter, you can do that. Or if you just want to stay at home and conserve petrol, that's probably what I'm gonna do, maybe. I don't know.

SPEAKER_10 1:16:32

You can do whatever you want.

SPEAKER_04 1:16:34

Yeah, we've petrol's 26 cents a litre cheaper now, so you know slightly better. Here's Stephanie Rowe, The World in Our Words, and part of the chat was about bringing the world together, which is an important message to have at times like this as well. Stay well, everyone, and we'll speak to you again next week. Here with Stephanie Rowe. We're here with Stephanie Rowe, who's holding a copy of The World in Our Words, volume two. It's the second edition of a poetry anthology drawing together poets from all around the world. Welcome, Stephanie.

SPEAKER_00 1:17:08

Thank you so much, James, for having me and welcoming me onto the radio. It is absolutely wonderful to be here.

SPEAKER_04 1:17:15

And so, how did the idea for the first volume of this poetry anthology that's drawing together poets of all experiences and all languages all across the globe together?

SPEAKER_00 1:17:25

So I was traveling at the time, and I had this wonderful idea when I was in Mexico to publish my own work, but I didn't have enough. And I love community and I love giving opportunities to other people. So I thought, why don't I just put a call out online? And so I did, and I had a really overwhelming response, and I wanted to platform not only English but all other languages because I think it's very important to include diversity, but to also show that there is other languages outside of English, and so that was how it was born, and through that I had five languages in the first edition. So we had Portuguese, Spanish, Vietnamese, Hebrew, and English, and I was very lucky and fortunate that all the poets translated them into English.

SPEAKER_04 1:18:18

And what was the response? Clearly, the response was great because in the second one you've got even more languages and more representation. How what was the response to the first anthology?

SPEAKER_00 1:18:26

It was interesting. So the response was overwhelmingly great. But when I had pitched the idea to a poet that I was going to include other languages, they just told me that it was going to be dead in the water, and that is an absurd idea. And why would I do that? No one's going to read other languages. But fortunately for me, I dismissed the commentary and I went forward, and it was really well received. And if anything, it built more depth and community within poetry because what I think everyone didn't realize at the time was that there's poets across the globe, and so it gave insight into other people's lives in different countries. And so in this second edition, we've got Arabic and we have English, and we also, I think we've got Swedish and we have Polish. So we've got three very different languages this time, and again, it has been so well received. And we have poets from Africa, we have poets from the United Kingdom, from Scotland, from America, we have Filipino, we have Indonesian. So like it is really a multicultural poetry book, and it is celebrating literature and also the diversity in language.

SPEAKER_04 1:19:41

Fantastic. And not only do you have the anthology, you have a Facebook page, which I've noticed has got 4,000 followers already, a poetry community developing on there. How's that taken off? And I imagine the word spread about the book through platforms like that as well.

SPEAKER_00 1:19:54

Oh, 100%. So, yes, I do have quite a few followers on the poetry page, The World and Our Words. It has been interesting to manage because I get a lot of messages and it's almost like a beacon, which is wonderful. Like I I love being the beacon in this kind of new poetry world. But today I went and I watched a speech on friendlies, and that it was interesting because I really want to bring it into in-person. And even though social media and poetry is just phenomenal, and you get to live through the spoken word when it comes to social media, but to have that community in person, I'm very much looking forward to transferring that into in person. But yes, it's a lot to manage, but it is also very rewarding.

SPEAKER_04 1:20:40

Fantastic. And I know you've had a lot of help from other poets in managing and writing interviews on that page, including our own Leon Ferrante, who's in the studio with us now. He's being quiet in the background, which is very unlike him. Unusual for Leon, but so you've seen poets from all around the world coming in and helping you build what you're doing as well.

SPEAKER_00 1:21:00

I have, and like online is really great for the international element because we can connect over borders and we can connect over time zones, which can be tricky at times. But it's been really great because I think in Australia we're very much. This is Adelaide, this is South Australia, this is Melbourne, this is Queensland, this is Western Australia. And really what my book is doing is dismantling all of the borders, all of the states, all of the different countries, and going, we are a collective internationally through words. And I think that's the real undertone of this book is to show that we are human beings, and there's a beauty, beauty of that, and we're doing this through words. So it is wonderful to be able to show not only the literary industry that there is a different way to publish, but there's also a different way to bring inclusivity through publishing these poetry books.

SPEAKER_04 1:22:00

Fantastic. And you talk about the different way of publishing as well. And I know with this book that the proceeds are shared equally among every poet in it as well. Can you tell us a little bit about the inspiration for that?

SPEAKER_00 1:22:10

Yes, I can. And I think that this, the first book that I published, again, I don't think that there were there might have been one poetry anthology at that time that was giving royalties back. But I don't think that this has been a normal thing. And when I pitched this idea, again, I had a bit of resistance within the industry. And I just thought to myself, someone has to do this, someone has to stand up and someone has to go, we can do this differently. We can give the royalties back to the poet. And I also wanted to show the poet that their craft is actually valued through the financial element. And so every single sale that is made of the world now words, the royalties get split up every quarter and go back to the poet. And I had recently had a bookstore go, where's all the money? And I was like, in the poet's pocket. And so, yeah, so does it ruffle feathers? It definitely ruffles feathers. But you know what? In history, if we go back, there's always one person that has to be the person that changes things. And I could not continue being in the publishing industry and allow this to continue. I was like, we need to shift our mindsets of how we engage with writers and poets, and I will be that beacon and I will be that person to change the industry. And now, since I've published the second edition in the last couple of years, I've actually seen other poetry anthologies giving back the royalties to the poets. And I think if I had done one job right, it was just that.

SPEAKER_04 1:23:46

Fantastic. And you've talked about all the other poets that you're supporting as well. But can you tell us a little bit about your poetic practice and how you came to it and the style of poetry that you write as well?

SPEAKER_00 1:23:56

Oh, thank you, James. People normally don't ask that question. So I have always written. I did actually leave school and was not able to write, so I had to teach myself. And I but I kept all of my books, and that's how I knew how bad I was as a writer and how illiterate I was when I left school because it was all jumble. But then as I was teaching myself and I was learning how to use grammar and I was learning how to play with words, and I was practicing the books that I went back and read, I could see how I was developing. And so there's some poems that I wrote, which I didn't realize I was writing at the time, that they were called poems that are just beautiful consciousness. And so it's from essentially late teens to early 20s, was when I started, and I've just continued. And for me, I call it a lightning strike. So I don't sit down and just write poetry. I have a lightning strike that hits me, and I have to stop everything that I'm doing to write what I'm feeling. And so that is how you will be when you read my work, that is literally how it is formed, is like everything in my world needs to stop, and I need to literally just write it out. And normally my work, I do, I smash out in about five minutes, and then I go back and I re-edit it, and I then that's it. I don't touch it again. But it is this absolutely overwhelming sensation of just I need to write. And that's what I love about poetry. It's so subjective. But these words that I have created into poems will last far beyond my years of being on this earth and will impact people that I will never ever meet. And I think that's the most beautiful thing about poetry.

SPEAKER_04 1:25:41

Fantastic. And it's a great way when you get that lightning strike as well for processing emotions and feelings and getting them out on paper as well. Is that something that you find useful with it as well?

SPEAKER_00 1:25:50

Oh, definitely. So the work that's in the second edition of The World Now Words, you definitely go, it was over the last like a year to year and a half. It's all new writing, and you essentially go on a journey of me dealing with the world that we're living in. So I have written very political poems. I've written poems about my separation with my husband and how that has been so difficult for me. I've also then written fun poems. Like it is like my poems in this edition is definitely a representation of the world that we live in and the complexity of being a human being. Like I see myself as a reflection of the world, and that is a very complex way of writing poetry. So I definitely take you on a journey of all things.

SPEAKER_04 1:26:41

Fantastic. And what can you tell us about the launch of this edition? Because I know the launch the official launch is coming up soon.

SPEAKER_00 1:26:47

It is coming up soon. Oh my god, I'm so excited. So we have locked in the 12th of April, which is a Sunday at 1 p.m. at Future Juice, which is in Adelaide, and we're launching it in Adelaide. It's at 1 p.m. Come down support. It the space is a gallery space, so there will be works on the wall, but we are doing a video and we're compiling people's recordings, which is wonderful. And then there's going to be visual, so we're going to be projecting that on the wall. We're going to try and incorporate having a musician to start off with. It's going to be a celebration not only of the World and Our Words and poetry and written word, but it's also going to be a celebration of multi-art. So I am one that wants to uplift and give opportunities at every single chance that I get. And so this is going to be a launch to remember.

SPEAKER_04 1:27:40

Fantastic. And yeah, great new artistic collective future juice of a new Adelaide venue. And so that's a great space. And as you say, doing things differently. They're definitely doing things differently there and imagining new ways of doing things as well. So it's a good coming together. And I'm sure Leon will get up and say a few words as well. I'm sure you know me might. Get up and say a few words at the event as well. Won't be able to keep him aw away from that launch either. Thank you. I know Leon, you've attended Future Juice as well. And I imagine he was a lot of help in connecting you with that.

SPEAKER_00 1:28:11

He won. I had struggled to find a venue. That's why I'm in Adelaide at the moment because I w needed to come over. I wanted to show that I was very present and I actually wanted to advocate for this book in the city. And so I drove over eight and a half hours from Melbourne. And I went in and I met a few people yesterday, but one of them was Future Juice. And it was just synergy because like they have life and passion. And it's such a wonderful, refreshing moment when you meet another human being that actually values art and wants to do things differently. And I was just like, give me ideas because anything is art. Give me performance. Give me, let's really make this something to remember. Because yes, poetry is it does have a connotation that it's old, which it is. It was originated in 1500s. But I think that we're definitely having a new wave of youth and energy coming in. And I think with that gives us opportunity to bring in different ways of conceiving how poetry can then transfer over. So bringing it visually, we're wanting to, I'm really hoping that the time zones work and we get some of the international poets up because I'm going to project them onto the screen and hopefully they can interact with the audience as well. Because like it's this is an international book, and I want the presence of that to be actually felt in Adelaide itself. Like, how amazing is this? Like, we're going to be in Adelaide launching this book and we're going to have international poets on the wall. That's it's a pretty cool concept.

SPEAKER_04 1:29:39

Fantastic. The 12th of April at 1 p.m. I was combining the time and the date. We'll edit that out afterwards because it's a good thing about pre-recorded interviews. We can edit that out. So it's the 12th of April at 1 p.m. at Future Jews. That's fantastic. And you get to enjoy the fringe and the festival while you're here as well. Stephanie Rowe, thank you very much for coming in and talking about the world in our words, volume two, a collaborative global poetry anthology. And it's great work that you're doing getting those poets out and published in books, and I'm sure it's very meaningful for them and for everyone involved. So thank you again.

SPEAKER_00 1:30:11

Thank you so much for having me, and thank you for this opportunity. And I just wanted to leave on we actually have three poets from South Australia. So we have two which are in Adelaide, and we have one which is in Flinders Rangers, and she's one of the youngest poets, and she's 15. And I'm just like, we're all coming together. So although it's international, the flag of South Australia and Adelaide is definitely being flown in this edition. So thank you so much, James.

SPEAKER_04 1:30:37

My pleasure. As it should be, of course. Excellent. Thank you again.