Surfacing urban wetlands in two urban renewal sites in Sydney. Urban wetlands in Australia provide benefits for climate change mitigation, pollution reduction, habitat provision and socioecological connection. However, in large cities like Sydney, urban wetlands are unseen because undergrounded, and, therefore not adequately understood. This illegibility, and loss of understanding by residents, planners and policy makers impedes wetlands' good management. This project surfaces wetlands through v ....Surfacing urban wetlands in two urban renewal sites in Sydney. Urban wetlands in Australia provide benefits for climate change mitigation, pollution reduction, habitat provision and socioecological connection. However, in large cities like Sydney, urban wetlands are unseen because undergrounded, and, therefore not adequately understood. This illegibility, and loss of understanding by residents, planners and policy makers impedes wetlands' good management. This project surfaces wetlands through visualisation in a multimodal knowledge platform focusing on two urban renewal sites, Green Square and Marrickville South. We leverage design ethnography to develop resources for strengthening multiple stakeholders’ socioecological engagement through methods empowering just, creative and open participation.Read moreRead less
Avatars and Identities. The avatar, a virtual representation of its user, is the key element of interface technology for everyday computer use in the twenty-first century. While specialist aspects of the avatar have received intensive attention from the technology industries and scholars, the focus of the work to date has been on the technical efficiency of the interface, rather than understanding the full social implications of its use. Through a historical, ethnographic and critical analysis o ....Avatars and Identities. The avatar, a virtual representation of its user, is the key element of interface technology for everyday computer use in the twenty-first century. While specialist aspects of the avatar have received intensive attention from the technology industries and scholars, the focus of the work to date has been on the technical efficiency of the interface, rather than understanding the full social implications of its use. Through a historical, ethnographic and critical analysis of the role of the avatar, in consultation with industry, this project offers a unique opportunity to develop a wider perspective that will contribute to an understanding of the uses and policies for the digital economy.Read moreRead less
A Design History of Australian HIV/AIDS Public Health Campaigns 1983-2004. This project investigates the differing roles of governments and community organisations as influential factors in the formulation of graphic representations which characterise the prevention campaigns used in the HIV/AIDS epidemic in Australia 1983-2004. It explains how graphic representations, functioning as an index of official and public responses to the epidemic, impact on the aesthetic and professional autonomy of t ....A Design History of Australian HIV/AIDS Public Health Campaigns 1983-2004. This project investigates the differing roles of governments and community organisations as influential factors in the formulation of graphic representations which characterise the prevention campaigns used in the HIV/AIDS epidemic in Australia 1983-2004. It explains how graphic representations, functioning as an index of official and public responses to the epidemic, impact on the aesthetic and professional autonomy of the designer. Complimenting existing quantitative assessments this study uses a textual-visual analysis and triangulation method to demonstrate the agency of these institutional constraints placed within the broader range of material forms relating to the campaigns including brochures, posters, and videos.Read moreRead less
Dynamic media: innovative social and artistic developments in new media in Australia, Britain, Canada and Scandinavia since 1990. This study will foreground strengths and remedy weaknesses in Australian new media arts and innovative social uses of new media. By studying the international strategies for social use of dynamic media, this study will provide information for Australians to more extensively implement dynamic media within a social context. It will highlight the innovation of Australian ....Dynamic media: innovative social and artistic developments in new media in Australia, Britain, Canada and Scandinavia since 1990. This study will foreground strengths and remedy weaknesses in Australian new media arts and innovative social uses of new media. By studying the international strategies for social use of dynamic media, this study will provide information for Australians to more extensively implement dynamic media within a social context. It will highlight the innovation of Australian artists and researchers in the development of dynamic media and position these internationally. A major long-term benefit of this study will be an online database that will both profile and be accessible to Australian artists, arts organizations, new media researchers and social innovators. Read moreRead less
A new theory of Aboriginal art. The paradigms developed by scholars have a huge impact on the value of art. After the Australian artworld repositioned Aboriginal art from the frame of 'primitive art' to that of contemporary art, the price of and market for Aboriginal art increased enormously. However, Aboriginal art failed to penetrate the international contemporary artworld because the paradigms of contemporary art within which it was framed were outmoded. Through examining the production of Ab ....A new theory of Aboriginal art. The paradigms developed by scholars have a huge impact on the value of art. After the Australian artworld repositioned Aboriginal art from the frame of 'primitive art' to that of contemporary art, the price of and market for Aboriginal art increased enormously. However, Aboriginal art failed to penetrate the international contemporary artworld because the paradigms of contemporary art within which it was framed were outmoded. Through examining the production of Aboriginal art from the perspectives of its producers and recent globalised contemporary art practices, this project aims to develop a new theory of Aboriginal art that is more aligned with the thinking of current curators who set the agenda at the upper end of the market.Read moreRead less
Cinema and the Senses: Temporality of the films of Stanley Kubrick, Terrence Malick and Kumar Shahani. The resulting monograph, articles and seminars will provide new methodologies for Australian cinema studies which has tended to depend on Euro-American models. The project offers three distinct ways of thinking about an ecology of the human senses in and through cinema. The ideas on cine-synaesthesia would link up with current research on this topic in other disciplines such as neurophysiology, ....Cinema and the Senses: Temporality of the films of Stanley Kubrick, Terrence Malick and Kumar Shahani. The resulting monograph, articles and seminars will provide new methodologies for Australian cinema studies which has tended to depend on Euro-American models. The project offers three distinct ways of thinking about an ecology of the human senses in and through cinema. The ideas on cine-synaesthesia would link up with current research on this topic in other disciplines such as neurophysiology, painting and music. The interdisciplinarity of the project offers, to the public sphere of Australian cinema, cross-cultural and cross-media perspectives on film aesthetics. Read moreRead less
William Faulkner Between Cinema and Literature. Literature continues to react and adapt to an ever-more complex media environment, but there is still little in the way of detailed critical study to specify the strategies and tactics of literary survival in an audio-visual era. By attending to the unique and indicative case of William Faulkner, who wrote simultaneously for the films and the serious literary market, this project will develop a new critical model for understanding literature's ada ....William Faulkner Between Cinema and Literature. Literature continues to react and adapt to an ever-more complex media environment, but there is still little in the way of detailed critical study to specify the strategies and tactics of literary survival in an audio-visual era. By attending to the unique and indicative case of William Faulkner, who wrote simultaneously for the films and the serious literary market, this project will develop a new critical model for understanding literature's adaptation to a complex media environment. It will shed significant intellectual light on the present and future states of literary survival in advanced industrial nations like Australia. Read moreRead less
Cinematic Imaginations: American Literature and the Visual Media, 1905-1945. The advent of new visual media in the late C19th, and their rapid growth and industrialization in the 20th, obliged the traditional forms of literature to change. This project investigates that change in the American context, as a set of interlinked adaptations, in both literature and cinema, to more general social changes in an emergent mass-production economy. Arguing for a ?media ecology?, the project's originality i ....Cinematic Imaginations: American Literature and the Visual Media, 1905-1945. The advent of new visual media in the late C19th, and their rapid growth and industrialization in the 20th, obliged the traditional forms of literature to change. This project investigates that change in the American context, as a set of interlinked adaptations, in both literature and cinema, to more general social changes in an emergent mass-production economy. Arguing for a ?media ecology?, the project's originality is to establish a viable model for analysing this shift in the complexion of a culture, in terms of an explosive expansion of the cultural economy.Read moreRead less
Highly Scalable Video Compression with Finely Embedded Motion Signalling. Highly scalable video compression is critical to the emergence of new applications in video distribution and management. Examples include interactive remote browsing of video and robust video surveillance over shared networks. Previous ARC funding produced fundamental breakthroughs in scalable video compression, resulting in a new paradigm which has been adopted by leading researchers in the field. The present project a ....Highly Scalable Video Compression with Finely Embedded Motion Signalling. Highly scalable video compression is critical to the emergence of new applications in video distribution and management. Examples include interactive remote browsing of video and robust video surveillance over shared networks. Previous ARC funding produced fundamental breakthroughs in scalable video compression, resulting in a new paradigm which has been adopted by leading researchers in the field. The present project addresses the two most important problems which currently limit the potential of this paradigm. Inspired by the applicant's recent discoveries, the outcomes of this project are likely to represent significant scientific breakthroughs and contribute to a new international video coding standard.Read moreRead less
The Business of Art: Corporate Interventions into the Production, Display, and Reception of the Visual Arts. The corporate presence in the Australian art world has increased exponentially over the past decade, resulting in a redefinition of the arts as an industry not to be subsidised but marketed. This project's analysis of the art historical implications of this corporate presence and an assessment of the aesthetic impact of increased corporate interventions into the production and display of ....The Business of Art: Corporate Interventions into the Production, Display, and Reception of the Visual Arts. The corporate presence in the Australian art world has increased exponentially over the past decade, resulting in a redefinition of the arts as an industry not to be subsidised but marketed. This project's analysis of the art historical implications of this corporate presence and an assessment of the aesthetic impact of increased corporate interventions into the production and display of art is of vital significance to the future of Australia, not only in terms of the quality and type of art that is produced by Australian artists, but also to the way that Australians understand the role of the visual arts in their society.Read moreRead less