From privileged mansplaining to woke self-improvement – confession, critique, (dis)comfort, consolation and atonement. 

ROARAWAR FEARTATA is long time collaborative duo – Ben Cittadini and Craig Peade. A few years ago, they undertook a Seedpod Residency with Punctum – Small Catastrophes, which played out in the ‘malls’, streets and shopping centres in Bendigo, culminating in a collection/conference exposing their rituals for gathering poetic data and its evaluation.  This helped inform Ben Cittadini’s practice based Phd, while Craig Peade created his ‘Sexorcism’ in collaboration with Punctum as one of the ‘lots’ for sale in our Green Room award winning ‘Complete Smut Live Art Auction’ 

They will conduct an “open immersive experimental performative work-in-progress laboratory workshop installation lecture”. Their ‘What if…’ studio/lab will help with the development of their next work. 

This studio/lab would be of interest to those whose curiosity is piqued by the vicissitudes of a long-term collaborative process that asks provocative questions of power and authority, whilst courting experimental research practices of risk, failure and entropy. 

Roarawar’s ‘What if…seedpod residency proposes: “provocations within the contexts of a so-called ‘crisis of masculinity’ and toxicity of socio-cultural political movements such as Men’s Rights and other exemplars of reactionarism”. 

The questions this next project asks might include: – Are men an ideology? Are a couple of artists whom might be identified as ‘feminist allies’ and ‘privileged white middle-class and middle-aged males’ permitted to perform an appropriation of iconic feminist artifacts such as Valerie Solanas’ S.C.U.M. Manifesto? 

They make mischief by crossing wires with an uncommon sense – i.e. “the cellos do what the trombones should be doing”.