Sam Nightingale and Polly Stanton are hosting ‘Artist Fieldworking: Locations, Methods and Responses’, an afternoon salon on 4 December in Melbourne that brings together screenings, presentations and listening sessions that engage with artist fieldwork. The event is a collaboration between RCA Media Studies, London, and RMIT, in Melbourne, to celebrate the forthcoming release of the second print edition of our book Fieldwork for Future Ecologies.

The salon presents works from some of the book’s original contributors paired with new collaborators to examine the subject of artist-based fieldwork as an unfolding assemblage of practices, conversations, and site-based responses to the ‘the field’ as an active (and at times difficult) site of research and production.

Including film, sound works, and photography, the event explores what draws artists to the field and the unique experimental and investigative possibilities that form between place, bodies, and process. Discussions will centre on what it means to ‘do’ fieldwork across, in-between and outside of disciplinary boundaries, including the ethical and political implications of working in relation to contested sites and the geographies acutely impacted by climate crisis.

The salon includes works and presentations from international artists and researchers Bianca Hester @bianca.hester David Burns @david_burns , Nicholas Mangan @nicholas.mangan, Olivia Koh @liv__koh, Philip Samartzis, Sonia Leber @sonia_leber and David Chesworth @chesworth.d Sonia Levy @sonia__levy and Susan Schuppli @susan_schuppli.

This event, hosted by the book’s editors, Sam Nightingale (Royal College of Art @royalcollegeofart ) and Polly Stanton (RMIT), is a collaboration between the School of Media and Communication (RMIT, Melbourne) and Media Studies, School of Architecture (Royal College of Art, London).

Fieldwork for Future Ecologies will be available for preorder at the salon and very soon via @perimeterbooks (Aust and NZ) and @onomatopeenet (Europe).

Mosaic Rooms, London
4 June 2024, 7pm