ACQUA ALTA 3

2010

ITALIAN INSTITUTE OF CULTURE 
MELBOURNE

 single channel videos with sound, photographs, reimagined found objects and furniture, handcrafted sculptural elements, forty resin mooring rings,1100 metres of rope

Dimensions Variable

The Acqua Alta Project comprised four site-specific installations incorporating variously photographs, drawings, video elements and reimagined found objects. Common to each installation was a series of handcrafted sculptural elements that functioned as anchor points for a spatial drawing composed of hundreds of metres of rope.

The first iteration of the project was Hazewinkel’s contribution to the group exhibition Overlap 3 (2006) presented at the British School at Rome following his Australia Council for the Arts studio residency in Rome. It was further developed into the Acqua Alta Project over the following years.

Installed across two levels at the Italian Institute of Culture Melbourne Acqua Alta 3 occupied storage spaces, libraries, teaching rooms, formal reception salons and terraces. Three thematically related videos were presented alongside sixteen photographic panels configured as a single work, reimagined found objects and handcrafted sculptural elements. In this iteration of the project forty transparent resin mooring rings fixed to the floor, walls and furniture linked with existing architectural elements to support a spatial drawing evocative of both a snare and a way finder, drawing visitors in and leading them through the sprawling building to individual works each drawing out themes associated with nature’s forces, precariousness and personal safety.


watch Turbulence here

watch Splinter Cycle here

watch Raft here


The Acqua Alta Project is documented in an accompanying publication, which includes images of all project iterations and texts by Geraldine Barlow, Rebecca Coates, Anthony Gardner and Stefania Manna. The individual essays are available at the Texts page of this website.


read Geraldine Barlow's essay Like the Thread of a River here

read Rebecca Coates' essay The Antique and the Everyday here

read Anthony Gardner's essay Lucciole here

read Stefania Manna's essay FCO-MEL Unspooling here