Playroom

Alfie BarkerAlfie Barker (aka Crocodile Cowboy) is a 24 year old autistic, transgender, queer artist living in Lutruwita/Tasmania with an ongoing exploration of joy occurring through mediums such as drawing, painting, ceramics and more. Alfie has a particular passion for designing unisex fashion that everyone can look and feel fabulous in. Through everyday art creation Alfie has learned to express himself, connect with others, and talk about the stigmas of mental health in our society.

Zeth Cameron (they/them) is an emerging installation artist interested in mixing media and moods as a form of audio-visual intervention. Their practice is grounded in their experiences with ADHD and gender non-conformity and embraces work that is tonally ambivalent or seemingly ‘incomplete’ as a sort of queer disability-led praxis.

Xanthe Dobbie is an interdisciplinary artist and researcher based on the unceded lands of the Wurundjeri people of the Kulin Nation in Naarm, Melbourne. Working across on- and offline modes of making, their practice aims to capture the experience of contemporaneity as reflected through queer and feminist ideologies. Drawing on humour, pop, sex, history and iconography, they develop shrines to a post-truth era. They have exhibited extensively locally and internationally with recent works including live-streamed theatre, interactive media, AR, VR, collage, performance and installation.
Significant exhibitions include Matrix Re-Loaded at RMIT First Site Gallery (2023), Cloud Copy at Lismore Regional Gallery (2023), The Long Now at ACMI (2022), and Don’t Be Evil at UQ Art Museum (2021). Xanthe recently won the Incinerator Art Award for Social Change and in 2023 was Guest Editor for Runway Journal Issue #46 Ghost. They co-founded performance series Queer PowerPoint for which they have performed at major festivals and institutions including MCA, Sydney Opera House, WA Museum, RISING, and Now or Never. Xanthe is currently undertaking a PhD focusing on digital and interactive art at RMIT University as part of the ARC Linkage Archiving Australian Media Art: Towards a Method and National Collection.

Ivan Jeldres“Just a lil’ guy who likes drawing things” is the sentence Ivan Jeldres (they/them) uses to describe themselves. A Naarm based illustrator and emerging artist with a longstanding love and passion for creating art, Ivan is driven largely by the joy their illustrations bring others. Their work often has a focus on their personal experiences as a trans masculine nonbinary person. Ivan’s works is recognisable by their strong use of bold shapes and colors which they employ throughout their works and has been translated across a number of mediums, such as painting, sculptor and digital art.

Dae Knight is an illustrator, performer, and data artist whose work draws on imagery, objects, and the captured self in an attempt at bridging the chasm of individuality to generate moments of genuine connection.

In Playroom they seek to assemble a collage of imagined queer childhoods, expressing its potential and fighting for it as an extant territory of connection within and without artistic spaces. They hope that this exhibition can be an invitation to community, to action, and a springboard for future work.

Jun Qiao 王俊俏Jun Qiao/俊俏 is an artist based in Naarm, who primarily makes illustrative art inspired by feelings of child-like wonder and their Chinese heritage. Playing with different mediums is an integral part of their art practice. The freedom of being a novice and the sensory experience is joyous and fuels their expression. They make pieces that incorporate more traditional Chinese art forms and styles, as well as their diasporic, queer point of view. Suzie has also been a part of organising events prioritising and fundraising for queer/trans BIPOC people and highlighting local DJs and performers.

Zoë Sydney (they/she/he) is a curator, painter, maker, and all-round snartist (science artist). They have an honours degree in fine arts and physics from the University of Western Australia, and they are currently living and working on Wurundjeri country in Melbourne. They are working on using emerging technologies in conjunction with textile work to develop new Queer relationships between artwork and viewer.With a background in quantum physics, they are also interested in the physical consequences of seeing and being seen. This has informed their recent exploration of drag performance and curation as a part of their practice.

Samuel Nugent is a multi-disciplinary artist and writer based in Naarm. Interested in psychology, queerness and intimacy, Nugent borrows heavily from their own personal autobiography to create immersive installations, intricately detailed oil paintings, uncanny sculptures and confessional poetry. Through creating a dialogue between past and present in their work, Nugent intends to initiate reflection and positive change.

Dae Knight is an illustrator, performer, and data artist whose work draws on imagery, objects, and the captured self in an attempt at bridging the chasm of individuality to generate moments of genuine connection.

In Playroom they seek to assemble a collage of imagined queer childhoods, expressing its potential and fighting for it as an extant territory of connection within and without artistic spaces. They hope that this exhibition can be an invitation to community, to action, and a springboard for future work.

Zoë Sydney (they/she/he) is a curator, painter, maker, and all-round snartist (science artist). They have an honours degree in fine arts and physics from the University of Western Australia, and they are currently living and working on Wurundjeri country in Melbourne. They are working on using emerging technologies in conjunction with textile work to develop new Queer relationships between artwork and viewer.With a background in quantum physics, they are also interested in the physical consequences of seeing and being seen. This has informed their recent exploration of drag performance and curation as a part of their practice.

Zara Sully is a multi-disciplinary artist, curator, and arts worker currently based in lutruwita (Launceston, Tasmania). Sully’s artistic practice contemplates an autobiographical and queer methodology. They are interested in forming collective communities through sharing their own personal experiences and relating to others. In Zara’s collaborative and community-driven curatorial practice, Sully is passionate about representing queer and under-represented artists who divulge personal histories and where this merges with the online and digital realm. Sully holds a BFA (Honours) from the Victorian College Of The Arts (2018) and Monash University (2019). Previous projects include Angel Exchange (hosted by Bus Projects, 2020), On Screen in the Flesh (curator, exhibited at Trocadero Projects 2020), Yours Queerly (artist & co-curator with Brooke Van Der Linden, exhibited at Sawtooth ARI, 2021), and Flow (co-curated with Dr. Helen Whitty, a collaboration between Huon Valley Council and City of Launceston, 2022). Current projects include Ways of Knowing, a collaboration between the University of Tasmania and Sawtooth ARI, as well as the upcoming exhibition Isn’t it Ironic set to be shown at Rosny Barn in May 2023. Sully is a board member of the Georges Mora Fellowship and Sculpture Tasmania and is the current Director of Sawtooth ARI. Their work is held in many public and private collections across so-called Australia. Sully’s favourite film is Twilight. @zarasully.artist

Sawtooth ARI is an Artist-Run Initiative, based in lutruwita, Launceston, Tasmania, committed to servicing our local and national communities. We aim to support voices telling the stories that need to be heard now, practices that break from oppressive traditions, and those that take risk in thinking and idea sharing.