Daily at 11:30am and 1:00pm (except Sundays and Mondays)
Friday 22 July until Thursday 4 August 2005
Galleries 1--3, Institute of Modern Art
Judith Wright Centre of Contemporary Arts, Brisbane

An installation-performance work comprising sculptures, video, floor- and wall-pieces made with volcanic soils from each of the individual mountains, projections of topographical drawings, environmental sound recordings, spatially manipulated electronics and live cello performances.

The Glass House Mountains are a series of ancient eroded volcanoes located in the Sunshine coast hinterland of Southeast Queensland, Australia. The ten mountains, named in Aboriginal lore, are powerful presences. Seen from across the water of the Pumicestone Passage, their mystical forms seem to float above the ground. They suggest iconic images of levitating rock, reverberating with the deep sonorities of gigantic bells.

The Glass House Mountains are a dramatic terrain for investigating the acculturation? of natural environments through processes of mapping. The project draws on the multiple histories surrounding these mountains. It reflects views from both an Indigenous knowledge base in which country is synonymous with spiritual and cultural values and European attitudes to land in which maps record histories of exploration, ownership and the exploitation of resources.

The installation project looks at different ways of mapping the Glass House Mountains as well as some of the cultural implications and frictions that might arise as Indigenous and non-Indigenous maps collide on the same sites. The project uses the Glass House Mountains as a prism to reflect on the archaeological dimensions of sites in country

On the one hand, there are the stories of the Gubbi-Gubbi nation, the oral or sonic maps that articulate relationships between sites in country and recognise the mountains as ancestor figures, there are language forms that were used to announce entry into clan territories and myths that connect astronomical observations to ritual places. On the other, there are the charts of explorers (Captain Cook, who named the mountains in 1770, Matthew Flinders, 1799 and 1802), topographical maps made by surveyors and army personnel (Dixon, 1842, Vance, 1920s), cadastral maps (showing ownership of land), geological and mining maps as well as very recent satellite images.

The artistic collaboration will draw upon the following resources: Indigenous oral histories, particularly stories surrounding Tibrogargan, historical records and images, early surveyor's charts, topographical, cadastral and satellite image maps and geological information. Additional technical assistance in producing elements of the installation will be provided by Urban Art Projects (Brisbane) and RMIT University's Spatial Information Architecture Laboratory (Melbourne).

Daryl BUCKLEY Artistic Director, ELISION Ensemble, Michael HEWES sound design, Peter MOOR video and camera work, Maria BARBAGALLO Video editing, Urban Art Projects, Daniel TOBIN, Yerko STARCEVIC, Chris NAGLE, Rachel SEE and Barry LEWIS of Roochutes mother mountain form, Georgia GLEN art assistance

Judy Watson and Liza Lim acknowledge the Traditional Owners of the Glass House Mountains.

glass house mountains is based on or contains data provided by the Department of Natural Resources and Mines, Queensland.

Special thanks to Lawrence HARVEY, SIAL (Spatial Information Architecture Laboratory) of RMIT, Victoria, and Bill KITSON and David MARKEY from the Department of Natural Resources and Mining, Queensland Government.