Exhibition — KSCA “The Art of Adaptation: Culture Changes Everywhere”
Kandos School of Cultural Adaptation (KSCA) have recently held a 10 year anniversary retrospective exhibition at the Manly Art Gallery & Museum (MAG&M), curated by Ben Rak and Katherine Roberts as part of the gallery’s Collective for Environmental Art & Design program. The exhibition has since gone on tour to the Blue Mountains Cultural Centre, where it will be up until August 2nd.
Nina Stromqvist has written a really sharp review of the exhibit that wonderfully captures the ethos, aims and tone of the exhibit and what KSCA has been up to this last decade. A quote from Nina:
And, if you’ll indulge me, another quote:
An artist, a farmer and a scientist walk into a bar..., a newspaper edited by Laura Fisher, Lucas Ihlein and myself in 2021, is included as part of the works, alongside a brilliant set of prefigurative experiments and microcosmic assemblages. Thank you to MAG&M for their invitation to look back on 10 years of KSCA, and the whole KSCA crew for pulling this show together. The exhibition catalogue can be accessed here for those interested in learning more about the contributing artists and KSCA.
The participating artists are: Diego Bonetto, Laura Fisher, Lucas Ihlein, Ian Milliss, Georgina Pollard, Imogen Semmler, Peter Swain, Leanne Thompson, Erika Watson, Kim Williams, Alex Wisser and Vickie Zhang. Contributing members to KSCA over the past decade include Gilbert Grace, Eloise Lindeback, Sarah Breen Lovett, Christine MacMillan, Emmanuela Prigioni and Kelly Reiffer.
Kandos School of Cultural Adaptation (KSCA) have recently held a 10 year anniversary retrospective exhibition at the Manly Art Gallery & Museum (MAG&M), curated by Ben Rak and Katherine Roberts as part of the gallery’s Collective for Environmental Art & Design program. The exhibition has since gone on tour to the Blue Mountains Cultural Centre, where it will be up until August 2nd.
Nina Stromqvist has written a really sharp review of the exhibit that wonderfully captures the ethos, aims and tone of the exhibit and what KSCA has been up to this last decade. A quote from Nina:
"I want to resist the familiar claim that exhibitions such as these reveal and make visible a network of cultures that already exist. The language of revelation keeps the attention fixed on what the gallery can recognise and interpret, and I would argue that the KSCA artists and their collaborators aren’t particularly motivated by "raising awareness" or demystifying the conditions that produce a crisis. Rather, they are more invested in prefigurative experiments and assembling resources for microcosmic futures.
And, if you’ll indulge me, another quote:
“The exhibition’s greatest achievement is that it resists reducing KSCA to a set of outcomes or retrospective evidence of something that happened elsewhere. Instead, it retains something of the joyful experimentation that has long characterised the collective’s activities. While the exhibition offers a partial glimpse into a practice that remains grounded in place and the work of cultural adaptation, it also trains our attention onto an underacknowledged lineage of artists, including Vivienne Binns and other feminist pioneers, whose work has long moved between community and institution, expanding our understanding of where art happens and who it is for. "
An artist, a farmer and a scientist walk into a bar..., a newspaper edited by Laura Fisher, Lucas Ihlein and myself in 2021, is included as part of the works, alongside a brilliant set of prefigurative experiments and microcosmic assemblages. Thank you to MAG&M for their invitation to look back on 10 years of KSCA, and the whole KSCA crew for pulling this show together. The exhibition catalogue can be accessed here for those interested in learning more about the contributing artists and KSCA.
The participating artists are: Diego Bonetto, Laura Fisher, Lucas Ihlein, Ian Milliss, Georgina Pollard, Imogen Semmler, Peter Swain, Leanne Thompson, Erika Watson, Kim Williams, Alex Wisser and Vickie Zhang. Contributing members to KSCA over the past decade include Gilbert Grace, Eloise Lindeback, Sarah Breen Lovett, Christine MacMillan, Emmanuela Prigioni and Kelly Reiffer.
07/2026
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An artist, a farmer and a scientist walk into a bar... installed at Blue Mountains Cultural Centre, Kandos School of Cultural Adaptation. Photo: Nina Stromqvist.
An artist, a farmer and a scientist walk into a bar... installed at Blue Mountains Cultural Centre, Kandos School of Cultural Adaptation. Photo: Nina Stromqvist.