Welcome to our list of arts and cultural events happening in the NSW Central West gathered from artists, event producers, great local venues and groups across the region. Use the contact or ticketing details listed with each event.
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‘There Is No Lead Mine Here’ by The Lawson Creek Arts Fellowship
Sat 7 October - Sun 19 November
19 artists from Central Western NSW have banded together to present There is No Lead Mine Here, an exhibition at WAYOUT Artspace in Kandos (7 Oct – 9 Nov) exploring the anxieties, impacts and consequences of having a large scale open cut silver mine approved within kilometres of your community. Inspired by the recent approval of Bowens Silver Mine, just 2k from the village of Lue and within 20k of the townships of Mudgee, Kandos, Rylstone and Gulgong, the artists have been asked to make work that speaks to the costs that our society incurs as we exploit and extract the resources necessary to our prosperity: costs which are often unfairly shouldered by the communities that exist where these extractions take place.
While the mining company is vocal in the promotion of its claims that the mine will be safe, that it has a social licence and that it will have minimal impact on the health, economy and environment of the area surrounding it, those who question these claims are often not heard. The 19 artists exhibiting in “There is No Lead Mine Here” have each made work relating to the experience of suddenly realising that your way of life, the health of your community, and your environment are suddenly under threat by the powerful economic and governmental forces that go into the approval of major industrial developments.
Rylstone based artist Gus Armstrong, who organised the exhibition, said “I knew we had to do something and so I reached out to my fellow artists and community members to invite them to have a say, to talk together about what this very frightening development meant to us as a community. This process seemed to happen with such a sense of inevitability, as though the system was designed to overlook the risks to the community. This experience isn’t exclusive to the artists or even just the farmers, but everyone thinks about it, even if in the end they might see the economic benefits of the mine. This is our opportunity to talk about these huge changes we are facing and the powerlessness we feel in the face of them.”
Exhibiting artists: Jo Albany, Gus Armstrong, Terry Burrows, Blak Douglas, Maddison Gibbs, Aleshia Lonsdale, Christine McMillan, Maddison O’Brien, Michael Petchkovsky, Georgie Polard, Andrew Robards, Henry Simmons, Lulu Wulf, Emma Syme, Peter Swain, Leanne Wicks, Julie Williams, Jason Wing, Alex Wisser
There is No Lead Mine Here will open with drinks and talks on Saturday 7 October, 4pm at WAYOUT Artspace, 71 Angus Avenue, Kandos.
Related Events
The What’s On calendar covers arts and heritage events happening across the NSW Central West in the local government areas of Bathurst Region, Blayney, Cabonne, Cowra, Forbes, Lachlan, Lithgow, Mid-Western Region, Oberon, Orange, Parkes and Weddin.
Event listings are sourced or supplied from local venues and arts organisations. Many events listed here have been originally shared by the organisers on social media. Whilst all care is taken – and accuracy is our priority – we can take no responsibility for date changes or the content of contributed information. Contact the event organisers listed for more details or to book tickets.
The best way to include your event is to use our SUBMIT HERE form (under the What’s On menu at the top of each page). These listings will be manually approved by the Arts OutWest team before publication. Please allow a couple of days for listings to be published. If you have submitted an event and want to make changes just email us at artsoutwest@csu.edu.au
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