2015 in review

As I sit quietly sipping my morning coffee, I am contemplating the year that has just blown past – 2015.

Without doubt it was a big year, with lots of travel, projects and collaborations. Many of the projects I have worked on are also long-term and ongoing, so I am thinking that 2016 will also be pretty busy 🙂

Here is a quick wrap of the year:

• In January I headed to the beautiful Taranaki region in Aotearoa to participate in SCANZ 2015 Water*Peace and hang out with my Intercreate buddies.
• February saw me back at University of Canberra, tutoring Cross Media Production.
• March was a pretty adventurous month as:
  • I headed to Phoenix, Arizona to present Aotearoa Wai at Balance Unbalance,
  • Also had a kick off meeting in Shepparton for the Way of the Turtle project
• April was all about funding applications – shouldn’t have wasted my time 🙂
• In May we travelled to Shepparton to run some workshops and meetings with Yorta Yorta Nation Aboriginal Corporation
• Enjoyed spending some time in Gympie in June, where I did a short residency at the Gympie Regional Gallery as part of the 6 Degrees of Separation exhibition and events. Also managed finally to get out to the Coorora Institute where I hope to do a residency at some point. It was great to meet Tamsin, Ross and Annika.
• This July was pretty special:
  • I headed off to the NT to hang out with my Rust, Dust and Water Memories collaborator and Ethos Global Foundation Executive Director, Renita Glencross. We spent a week in the APY lands south of Alice Springs and then a week in Darwin where we participated in Broadband for the Bush Forum.
  • I also initiated and led with a series of Innovation Month activities for the Energy Division of the Department of Industry, Innovation and Science. (Our team recently was given an award for this and our other innovation work).
• In August, I started work on a new website design for  Yorta Yorta Nation Aboriginal Corporation
• My September highlight was spending two weeks working in Shepparton with Yorta Yorta Nation Aboriginal Corporation on the website project.
• October was in Canberra focusing on data and collaboration.
• In November I went to Christchurch, where I was one of the writers in the ADA Booksprint project. It was a great project with some awesome peeps participating. You can purchase our text “A Transitional Imaginary: Space, Network and Memory in Christchurch online.
• In December I am focusing on a new Augmented Reality project for the Yorta Yorta Nation Aboriginal Corporation – an interpretive walk along the Murray River in Echuca.

Phew! No wonder I am a bit tired at the moment 🙂

Some hints for next year?

Well, in around 4 weeks we will be heading to Taranaki again to participate in Water Peace Power and work on the Way of the Turtle project with Lee Joachim and Martin Drury.

In March/April I will be taking some time out to relax in Bali and also celebrate a significant birthday 🙂

June will see us travelling to the Faroe Islands with the Clipperton Project.

Things also look exciting on the Canberra front with a couple of big projects in train for 2016.

Thank you!

I would like to take this opportunity to thank the many, many people who I worked with this year. From Intercreate, to my colleagues at the Department of Industry, Innovation and Science, to Yorta Yorta Nation Aboriginal Corporation, to Gympie Regional Gallery, to Ethos Global Foundation where I have been elected as one of the Executive Board. Here’s to many more adventures ahead 🙂 It was also wonderful to catch up with great friends – old and new. Last but defintely not least – I would like to thank my family  – Marty, Lukas and Oscar – thanks for being awesome and encouraging me to explore and learn xx