olony Collapse continued our ongoing collaborative project to micro-farm pockets of the city, cannibalising leftover building materials (and other devices of protection/preservation) in the construction of makeshift experiments in urban self-sufficiency.

At Firstdraft we investigated the possibilities for small-scale mobile honey production within and around the safer confines of the gallery, in preparation for building a much larger hybrid native beehive-food cart destined for Sydney Cove (Gwago Patabágun ___ We will eat presently). With food crisis, suburban sprawl and the colony’s precarious histories (and futures) on our minds, audiences were invited in to smell the flowers and talk to the bees.

he result of our studio residency at the Firstdraft Depot, Colony Collapse housed our first hive of native stingless bees in a repurposed meat safe, linked via a network of plumbing pipes to the park outside the gallery. The work included other developmental experiments relating to our subsequent project for the Museum of Contemporary Art, namely spindly honey-jar towers and a window drawing of our various bee carts making their way across time and space between the studio, the gallery, the old colony’s storehouse etc…

As part of the Firstdraft Emerging Artists Studio Program supported by Australia Council for the Arts