Sutherland Reflections aimed to create an experience for participation, artistic interventions and a creative spectacle in the form of a community driven kite flying artwork. The artists’ intention was to address the current attitude and relationship between the seeming “distance” of the disadvantaged communities in Sutherland and the international neighbouring telescopic observatory. The resulting artistic interventions employed a playful activity to fill the liminal space between these two communities and where their reality lies – between the earth and the stars. Together with youth of the Sutherland community, Lace and Neustetter played with ideas of perspective, reflection, shadows and reaching for the stars, with the intention of developing outcomes that are meaningful and thought-provoking while being spectacular, aesthetic and enchanting.
My Room at the Centre of the Universe is a 12 minute preview of a 60 minute film which, together with an illustrated resource book, departs from the act of sensitive and intensive observation common to the fields of astronomy, archaeology and the visual arts. A small Karoo farm outhouse becomes a space of contemplation and creativity for the main character, a 16 year old teenager from Sutherland. One small window in his room acts as a framing device through which he observes and contemplates the landscape, the skies and ultimately the universe: much like a telescopes for a physicist and indeed the view Hubble offers humankind.
