5 – 29 MARCH, 2015

‘Undercurrents’. HD video. stereo sound. 30m 45s. 2014

The Kiewa Hydroelectric scheme has remained hidden under the Australian Alps for 78 years since it’s inception. Below the mountainside it has continued to funnel the snowmelt and divert waterways into churning, underground turbines and through long steel pipes that carve a bright cylindrical path through alpine forest. This confluence of industry and the natural world strikes both a visual and aural moment of contrast — a juncture of environment and human endeavour that exists largely unseen and unheard.

Undercurrents is a moving image and sound work that traces the pathway of water as it travels through the distinct sites of the scheme, creating an audio-visual mapping that documents changes of place and time over a 12 hour day ­— from the first moments of the dawn ice-melt, to the last stages of dusk as the current is halted by the dark water of Junction Dam. Shifting and observational, the work presents a cinematic gesture of landscape that is at once ephemeral and stark.

Undercurrents was created during a supported residency at The Bogong Centre for Sound Culture.

This work continues Polly’s ongoing investigations into place and its cinematic renderings through the mediums of video and sound.

In addition to her art practice she has worked professionally in the film and television industries in post-production sound and screenwriting and has a Masters in Fine Art from RMIT University. She is currently a practice-based PhD candidate at RMIT and teaches video and sound production at Swinburne University.

Recent exhibitions included Moving Pictures, Expanding Space (Careof Gallery, Italy 2014) Melbourne Now (NGV 2013) Darkness On The Edge of Town (Perth Centre for Photography 2013) One After Another (Kings ARI 2013) and Imagined Spaces (Bristol Biennial, UK 2012). She has partaken in numerous residencies both in Australia and overseas and was the recipient of the ArtStart grant from the Australian Council for the Arts in 2012.