In an unprecedented collaboration, ACCA, Carriageworks and Mona will present concurrent exhibitions of new work by three women artists: Frances Barrett (ACCA), Giselle Stanborough (Carriageworks) and Sally Rees (Mona), from March 2020.

Announced in October 2018, Suspended Moment: The Katthy Cavaliere Fellowship awarded $100,000 to each of the three artists to create new work. Made possible by the estate of the late, Italian-born Australian artist, Katthy Cavaliere (1972-2012), each artist’s ambitious new project is focused at the intersection of installation and performance art practice.

At Carriageworks, Giselle Stanborough’s Cinopticon will contemporise philosopher Michel Foucault’s theory of the ‘panopticon’: instead of the few watching the many, today we watch each other and the few. In Cinopticon, Stanborough will examine web-based narcissism, corporate surveillance and the opacity of social media algorithms to explore how these coalesce to lead us through problematic terrain. Stanborough will work with her own personal online archive to create an immersive performance installation where audiences will see their reflection in unpredictable ways.

At ACCA, Frances Barrett will extend the parameters of the Fellowship’s solo commission to present new sonic compositions and live performances by multiple artists. Drawing on her background in performance, curating and collaborative models of making, Barrett will create a major sound installation in collaboration with Hayley Forward and Brian Fuata. It will be presented alongside specially-commissioned sound compositions by artists Nina Buchanan, Del Lumanta and Sione Teumohenga, whose works collectively address concepts including community building, healing and new environmental consciousness.

At Mona, Tasmanian artist Sally Rees will exhibit a new body of work centred around the ‘crone’. Adopting this folkloric archetype, Rees will challenge the perceived invisibility of ageing women in contemporary society, seeking to redefine the female elder as a powerful and transgressive figure.