Kerjasama: Exchange Residency between Australia and Indonesia launches in Alice Springs

^{Image: Tony Albert. Once upon a time... (Installation View) 2014, mixed media on paper, dimensions variable.}

Asialink Arts is pleased to announce the launch of the 2016 Kerjasama or ‘Collaborate’ residency between Australian Indigenous artist Tony Albert and Indonesian artist Timoteus Anggawan Kusno. Asialink will partner with Cemeti Art House in Yogyakarta and Artback NT in Alice Springs to offer this unique opportunity. For the next 6 weeks Kusno will join Albert in Alice Springs where they will share their arts practice with one another and connect with local Indigenous and non-Indigenous organisations. In September Albert will join Kusno for 6 weeks at Cemeti Art House, Yogyakarta.

Kerjasama is a crucial platform for Asialink to increase awareness of the Arts Residency Program to Indigenous applicants, and a means of supporting reciprocal residencies for Indonesian artists to Australia who have no governmental support. The program was also developed in response to the significant interest expressed by Asian artists to experience the Australian desert and increase their understanding of Indigenous and regional communities.

The 2016 Kerjasama exchange marks the third year of the program.  It launched in 2014 with recipients Reko Rennie (Indigenous-Australian) and Akiq AW (Indonesian) and followed in 2015 with Karla Dickens (Indigenous-Australian) and Doni Maulistya (Indonesian). A publication documenting the full Kerjasama program is planned for late 2016.