Montsalvat is excited to be hosting a video installation for Shelley O’Meara, former Montsalvat Artist-in-Residence and the inaugural winner of the Montsalvat Film Prize at the Victorian College of the Arts.

As part of the installation audiences will be treated to screenings of two of Shelley’s works, Bellows of a Church Shaped Hall , developed in collaboration with Gemma Notara and Caroline Ellis, and Four Seasons of Apocalypse, developed in collaboration with Gemma Notara and Chelsea Byrne.

Please also see below for further information about both films, with a trailer link to give you a sneak peek as to what to expect. You will also find biographies for the contributing artists to acquaint yourselves with their work.

Shelley O’Meara
Bellows of a Church Shaped Hall and Four Seasons of Apocalypse
The Residents Gallery
30th July - 7th November 2021

Bellows of a Church Shaped Hall - https://vimeo.com/562588922

Shelley O’Meara

A figure is confronted by an incomprehensible entity, and so, they dance.

As the first waves of the pandemic broke across the world in 2020 the artist was living alone

in a haunted cottage with little budget and no tripod. As all plans and goals for the year fell

away, Bellows of a Church Shaped Hall (2020) emerged frame by frame as an examination of

existential and intangible threat.

Featuring a score recorded on site by long time collaborator Gemma Notara and the dance of

Caroline Ellis, all elements of this film were made over the three months the artist lived in

residence at Montsalvat Arts Centre.

Four Seasons of Apocalypse

Gemma Notara and Shelley O’Meara

Four Seasons of Apocalypse (2021) is a series of short audiovisual works by sound/video artist

Gemma Notara and videographer/animator Shelley O’Meara (crossed wires collective). Made

over the course of 2020, each work is a means of processing the dysphoria of living through

multiple global crises, from natural disaster to health epidemic, as well as an expression of

disillusionment, isolation, and frustration with ignorant political leadership and archaic systems

of oppression that need to be destroyed.

i) APOCA2020

The 2020 Summer bushfires were catastrophic. After escaping fire-torn country, witnessing

crowds diving into the water to escape the oncoming flames, and spending an unanticipated

New Years Eve in an evacuation centre with families and children who had lost homes and

relatives, the artist wrote APOCA2020 in order to process this trauma. Using field recordings

and video footage collected during the chaos of the bushfires at the turn of the new year,

gemma notara collaborated with videographer/animator Shelley O’Meara to collate this

documentation with footage collected during the Montsalvat artist residency into a short

artfilm. A primary focus of this piece was texture, using colours evocative of the terror and

damage to the land that ensued. APOCA2020 is a powerful account of the catastrophic

endemic crisis of climate change in the modern world.

ii) RESPITE DANCE

During Melbourne’s first lockdown, Gemma Notara spent three months living inside a

climate-controlled, sound and light-proof giant refrigerator at Magnet Studios in the city’s

north. This piece expresses the relative isolation and wholly bizarre experience, while also

signifying the importance of human warmth, the healing power of friendship, support and

community.

iii) A LAW OF DIMINISHING RETURNS

The third work shows a struggle to relinquish the dis-ease and apathy with the state of the

world; feeling powerless to dislodge the political puppets responsible for hundreds of

thousands of deaths, displacement and poverty, knowing those in power are never held

accountable for their destruction. Watching civil war and genocide play out on screens,

witnessing the greed and willful hoarding of wealth, medicine and aid by the richest nations

whilst others perished - yet knowing that yielding to hopelessness and disengagement will not

create change.

iv) CYCLE FOUR (root synthesis collective)

Only love, compassion, allyship and collective action can fight evil and create change. Featuring

choreography by Shelley O’Meara and movement by Chelsea Byrne, Cycle Four is about finding

resolve and learning to keep faith in the face of adversity. Grief is a process - the only power

we have is how we respond to it. This piece serves as a reminder of the power and importance

of an open heart - acceptance; adaptability; generosity and hope.

SHELLEY O’MEARA

Shelley O’Meara is a Melbourne based video artist, animator, and dancer. Having recently

completed their Honours degree in Animation at the VCA, Shelley’s work combines live

movement, projected animation and intricate video layering techniques to develop highly

immersive works on and off the screen. Concerned with power, autonomy and the politicisation

of bodies; movement is Shelley’s primary storytelling tool and in 2019 they began training in

contemporary dance to broaden their understanding of dynamic movement and embodiment.

Shelley is a core member of interdisciplinary collective Root Synthesis and moonlights as a

performer with sight specific theatre group Gold Satino.

Winner of VCA’s “New Voice Award” for Of Safe Return (2016), recipient of the Signal Screen

Commission for An End in Itself (2017) winner of the Montsalvat Film Prize for It’s Brutal Baby

(2019) current participant in Dance House’s Emerging Choreographers Program (2021).

Opperating on Wurundjeri lands, Shelley recognises the sovereignty of Australia's first peoples.

CHELSEA BYRNE

Chelsea Byrne is a dance artist and educator based in Melbourne. She is VCA Masters of Dance

and Postgraduate Diploma of Performance Creation (Choreography) graduate, who’s

movement practice privileges image based improvisation and composition techniques

influenced by Rosalind Crisp, Deborah Hay and BodyWeather. Notable performance credits

include Hypnagogia (Amanda Lever 2015) and Tangi Wai… The Cry of Water (Victoria Hunt,

2017) for International Festival, Dance Massive. Production credits include, Body Acousmonium

(Melbourne Fringe 2019) for Slow Twitch Collective. Chelsea has a passion for community

engagement; she was Victorian Coordinator for global community dance festival Big Dance

2018 and currently working with Wild at Heart’s Hip Hop crew, Inkrewsive. As a member of

Root Synthesis Collective, Chelsea has collaborated on several live and screen works. She

directed Evolv (VCA, 2016), You. Me. Us. Here. Now. (VCA, 2016), Duets (VCA, 2017) and Play

(Inhabit Festival, 2018).

GEMMA NOTARA

Gemma Notara is a Sydney-based composer, sound and video artist. Gemma’s work

incorporates the organics of acoustic instruments, interwoven with digital manipulation and

electronics to create beautiful illusive soundworlds for the listener in both composed

acousmatic work and live multi-disciplinary performance. Their back-catalogue consists of

original electro-acoustic musical scores for contemporary dance performance, theatre and

experimental audiovisual works, as well as a newfound interest in videography.

Previous credits include Hothouse Theatre: Celsius2020 Independent Theatre Program,

Aotearoa Audio Arts Festival, SXSW Austin: Melbourne Hub, Federation Square Soundwalk for

Signal Screen Commissions, Works For Loudspeakers Listening Sessions (NZ), Music From Her:

Suffragettes Exhibition (NZ), Inhabit Dance Festival 2019, La Mama Theatre Explorations 2019,

The Zoo Creations for Projection Dance Co and more. They have released music with labels

Sonorous Circle and Works For Loudspeakers compilations, and host an experimental ambient

radio show Shift on Melbourne DIY station Pretend Radio. Gemma is a First Class Hons

graduate of both RMIT University and Victorian College of The Arts.