The regional intersection of art and isolation
South Australia’s peak body for visual art, craft and design is heading to the country, seeking out regional artists in an effort to build communities.
Through the new program Intersection, staff from Country Arts SA and Guildhouse are journeying around South Australia to catch up with the many artists who call our regions home.
Stopping in at Goolwa, Minlaton, Renmark and Mount Gambier, Country Arts SA visual arts manager Lauren Mustillo and Guildhouse artistic programs manager Samantha Faehrmann, together with staff from each organisation, will visit a selection of local artists in their studios to find out what the artists need to better do their jobs.
Guildhouse artistic programs manager Samantha Faehrmann tells CityMag the studio visits are not about helping artists commercialise their work, but instead have a focus on other supports they might need.
“The studio visits aren’t a pitch, they’re an exchange,” she says.
“It’s so special to see those intimate – to be in someone’s personal, creative space, and to witness creativity at play. It’s a very private space.
“Artists are working often in isolation… sometimes what we can do is just go in and say ‘however you’re doing your practice, if it’s meaningful and valuable to you, that’s enough’.
“We really come in to say, how do you want to do it?”
Guildhouse CEO Sarah Feijen says the studio visits are “really central to building connection and exchange” with regional artists.
“As an organisation, our mission and what we stand for is absolutely about igniting and sustaining professional careers for visual artists of all persuasions,” she says.
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“That’s our absolute skill set in being linkage and really, really understanding and being a safe and trusted place, but so connected right across the arts and culture community, and also more broadly.”
Guildhouse’s Samantha Faehrmann says it has been “humbling” to be welcomed by regional artists such as Emiko Artemis. This picture: Lana Adams
As part of the program, Samantha and colleagues from Guildhouse and Country Arts SA spend around four days in each area. The program is supported by the Ades Family Foundation, with a travel grant from Gordon Darling Foundation supporting the initiative.
So far, Intersection has taken them to Goolwa and Minlaton, with Riverland and Mount Gambier visits planned for September 5-8 and October 24-27, respectively.
For interested creatives who do not receive a coveted studio visit (which are handed out on a first-come, first-serve basis), an open community event is held in each location as well.
“Whether you’re an artist, if you’re an art lover, if you like creativity, if your kids like creativity, it is open to community,” Samantha says.
“It’s about the individuals, but we’re also focussed on wanting to help support peer-to-peer connection and building those strong, stable and supportive networks or communities of practice in the regional areas,” Sarah explains.
Samantha says the community events opened her eyes to not only the support artists need in regional areas but also the isolation they face.
“For everyone, I think holistically, and across who we’ve met so far, isolation is a key challenge and reality, in all of its different kinds of forms,” she says.
“At Goolwa, there were lots of people in the room that lived close to each other that didn’t know each other, and there were some people in the room that were nervous to introduce themselves to other people that they admired.”
This is where Samantha and her colleagues came in, fostering conversations and connections between attendees. Most left as proud members of a brand-new group chat or two.
Guildhouse holds a community event at each town in its four-town tour. This picture: Lana Adams
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Samantha told CityMag the program came about following a pilot trip to Port Augusta in 2022.
“The key reflections that I’ve heard and read on that was that we need to spend more time. It needs to be more than a day… We need time to physically be in the spaces, to really be able to build that relationship in a meaningful and ongoing way.”
Sarah says it was then Guildhouse decided “it was time we got out and actually went where artists are, rather than making them come to us”.
“What we realised is we don’t even know who’s out there and what they need.
“So rather than take one of our established [offerings]… we wanted to go back to basics and just go around and say ‘hello’ and say ‘here we are, we believe in you, we exist for you, who are you and what do you need?’”
“It always seems unfair that regional people have to come to Adelaide for help and support.
“It’s a really, really hard gig for artists… they have incredible resolve, resilience, commitment and everything.
“As individuals, they are everything. They’re the creative instigator, they’re the promoter, the financier, they have to do everything. So, the commitment for people to sustain a career in that…it’s really tough.”
Samantha and Sarah hope to increase the Intersection program to include more locations. This picture: Isabella Kelly
While there are two trips left of this round, the pair says they are keen to keep Intersection going.
“We have generated a lot of interest…and we just want to be able to do more, so that we can meet that need,” Sarah says.
“We would have been sort of 200 per cent over prescribed, which just demonstrates how valuable it is and how much need there is out there.
“Our intention is just to keep filling in the gaps and to get more regional and remote…We want to be able to go back. To either meet the people we couldn’t see, and to maintain connection and support for those that we did.”
Samantha agrees, saying Guildhouse has big dreams for regional South Australia.
“We have sort of been dreaming about regional symposiums and making everyone come out of the metro into the regions, like, let’s flip it.”