Survival River Series: Whanganui - Gold Waters

Survival River Series: Whanganui - Gold Waters | Brydee Rood 2016 | Te Whare O Rehua Whanganui - Sarjeant Gallery Whanganui New Zealand.

Floating with a composition of survival blanket pieces on the Whanganui River, I became a caretaker and guardian of the river, seeking balance within a fragile relationship between man and river, the precarious materiality of the pieces an ever shifting dialogue. Survival River Series speaks to the state of emergency faced by many rivers across the world and our complex role as poisoners and potential saviours.

Video stills x2 detail x1| Survival River Series: Whanganui - Gold Waters

There is something very fascinating to me that exists between ritual and habit; of the things we do habitually versus an act of ritual, it seems pretty murky and vague sometimes, maybe some old habits become rituals and some old rituals become habits - the conscious, unconscious, practiced and learnt knowledge that inherently develops our mentality and belief structure and the age old questioning of why we do the things we do? Man’s contemporary relationship with water is questionable, underscored by geopolitics; viewed as a resource to be used, polluted, wasted and consumed at a price all be it economic, social and environmental. The work seeks to quiet the imposed value of water within a capitalist structure, to evoke an alternative value and express a reverent positive memory exchange with the body of water existing within us and connecting us to the earths Rivers.

Sarjeant Gallery Podcast In this episode of the podcast host Sarah McClintock talks with artist Brydee Roods about her practice, performance art, and her new work in the exhibition Still Water Goes Stagnant.

Survival River Series: Whanganui - Gold Waters

Still Water Goes Stagnant - exhibition view | Curator: Sarah McClintock

Survival River Series: River Flag 

Still Water Goes Stagnant - exhibition  view | Curator: Sarah McClintock 

Images: Brydee Rood 2016

Monsoon Prayer for Anjuna River

Monsoon Prayer for Anjuna River - 'We Are Weather Series' | Brydee Rood 2016 | Site specific performance on the river steps by St Anthony's Church in Siolim during the Sao Joao Festival. A second Monsoon Project, following the rains and carrying the ritual bathing cloth from Cemeti Art House Indonesia to HH Art Spaces & Residencies Goa India 2016

Catalogue Text - HH Art Spaces & Residencies Open 9: Monsoon Prayer for Anjuna River is a ritual steeped in the fluid landscape, the artist leads a silent ceremony in the depth of Goa's Monsoon, a communication with the water echoing a sensitive human footfall between earth and sky, a slow meditative prayer for our rapidly changing climate. The old steps form a passage between man and river - by occupying this space, 3 bodies wearing hand painted clay Matka water-pots over their heads and cloaked in garments folded, draped, dyed with natural indigo and detailed with drawings which reference invented ritual, water and change gods - seek confluence within bodies of water, monsoon, patterns of climate change and the localised water festivities of Sao Joao. Geopolitically the action is underscored by the here and now, it is part of an ongoing movement titled 'We Are Weather' reflecting a yearning for our deeper connection with the natural world; the River, weather, to water as an essential life force, not limited as a commodity, resource, thing to be used, consumed, wasted, polluted and profited by in a flailing globalised capitalist system. 

Images: Brydee Rood 2016

What is perceived today may not exist tomorrow…

What is perceived today may not exist tomorrow… | Performance, video and installation project at Asia:NZ Foundation and Cemeti Art House Residency Pasang Air #2 Yogyakarta Indonesia 2016

Indonesian Art Researcher Stanislaus Yangni writes: Rood’s intimate works evolve from an enduring personal passion with the natural world and ecological issues. During the residency, she choose water as an element to speak about human alienation with nature, and created a live bathing project in Sendang Kasihan, Bantul Village; her work was an encounter between mysticism, tradition, environmental change and peoples everyday habits relating with water. What is perceived today may not exist tomorrow… is the title of Rood’s installation containing 6 video works within a multi channel video and sound project. The Rainmaker (2 videos), Bodies of Water (3 videos) and Rain Keeps Falling (1 video) offer us a meditative perception.

Composite Image - 4x Video Stills: Bodies of Water

Bodies of Water Ritual Bathing Action |  Photographer: Mella Jaarsma

Materials: Natural Indigo dyed Batik drawings combining DIY homemade cassava paste resist and Shibori tie-dye processes worn as ritual bathing cloth for the live performance action in the Sendang Kasihan.

The Rainmaker - a 2channel video installation has also been exhibited in Auckland's Malcolm Smith Gallery Uxbridge Arts and Culture in the exhibition Sacred Economies curated by Balamohan Shingade - reviewed by John Hurrel on Eye Contact with images of the exhibition on Arts Diary

2channel Video Stills: The Rainmaker

Video Still: Rain Keeps Falling

Images: Brydee Rood 2016

Between Worlds

Between Worlds | Brydee Rood and Harpreet Singh | A guided performance walk from Auckland Diwali Festival to The Story of Rama exhibition at Auckland Art Gallery Toi o Tāmaki 2015

Between Worlds is an interactive walking performance and live installation using 52 handmade flags created from saffron hued turban cloth, carried by people transforming into an ephemeral installation in the Auckland Art Gallery Pool. We were inspired by the Rama exhibit, lakes and rivers features prevalently in many of the Rama miniature paintings the acknowledging of water is also symbolic of a point of crossing from place to place, making a journey to The Next World as in the story of Rama and the title of the final chapter which has inspired our title Between Worlds. Between Worlds opens up a universal context and shifts between - crossing the divide from the Diwali Festival and Auckland Art Gallery and making journeys in life crossing oceans and cultures to new places and peoples. 1 tonne of river stones fills 52 buckets forming the resting installation.  

Procession Photographs: David St George | Installation Photographs: Brydee Rood

The inspiration for the 52 flags comes from the Sikh tradition and story of Diwali, the narrative as a metaphor for the procession that we will make has many relevant crossovers to contemporary life, migration, climate change, displaced peoples, the act of coming to new lands; fusing these universal narratives together in a localised Auckland multicultural context and the unique platform which gives a voice to contemporary art practice and navigates both physical and theoretical space between the Auckland Art Gallery and the Diwali Festival.

Images: Brydee Rood and Harpreet Singh 

Pilgrimage to the Site of Waste Windows | A Memorial Service

Pilgrimage to the Site of Waste Windows - A Memorial Service | Brydee Rood in collaboration with the Schöppingen Firemen's Band | Site: Daldrup Kunststoffverabeitung Schöppingen during the KWW Artist Residency, Art Science Economy Fellowship with Stiftung Künstlerdorf Schöppingen.

During the Arts Science Economy Residency with Stiftung Künstlerdorf Schöppingen I held a memorial service for waste plastic PVC windows involving a pilgrimage to the local factory site of waste PVC windows and a collaboration with the town’s Firemen’s Band. The sound installation and performance was situated directly within the factory bounds both indoors and outside amongst the mountainous piles of waste windows; broken, smashed and discarded PVC frames, heaped and strewn, peppered with glass, metal bits, foam oddities formed a new landscape within the existing semi industrial semi rural surrounds. Like a pilgrimage to a sacred land or temple, the act of bringing an audience to this site of collected waste became an integral part of the work. The performance was an experimental funeral composition, hinting at life cycles and reincarnation, a serenade to the windows which frame our existence; in architecture, such common things - we look out of windows everyday, separating us from the outdoors - yet here the retired windows accumulated, put out to pasture, forming a bizarre material landscape.

Images: Brydee Rood 2015

A Warm Breeze Blowing

A Warm Breeze Blowing | Brydee Rood 2015 | Site Specific Performance and Sound Installation

A TIDELINES project curated by Jaenine Parkinson in tandem with Waterfront Auckland, The Arts Foundation - Boosted NZ, Silo Park. Rood performed the work in collaboration with Tamashii Taiko Drummers. The performance of A Warm Breeze Blowing unfolded on on a stepped terrace, intersecting where land meets sea. The essential action of dumping a sacred offering of 4tonnes of melting ice from Sanfords the local seaside fish market, onto the sea steps to greet the rising tide was a ritual act of global cooling. 

Link: A Warm Breeze Blowing published on 1MillionWomen Climate Change Action

Photographer: Joanna Wright | Images: Brydee Rood 2015

River Flag

River Flag | Brydee Rood 2015 | Site-specific Performance | Peepal Tree Art Project - Healing Hills Art Residency Morni Hills Haryana India | Materials: Bamboo Thermal Survival Blankets, Jai Mate Di Prayer Flags, Tape, Cotton

Photographers: [above] Satadru Sovan [below] Sandeep Sahdev

Rood harnessed energy, carrying a handmade 6meter bamboo flag cut from gold and silver foil emergency survival blankets, tracing a line of quickening pace through the wheat-fields of Badisher Valley in Morni Hills. River Flag melded into a series of a ritual flag-bearing movements intersecting the point where land meets the flow of the Ghaggar River atop an outstanding rock where lies a small Khera(a temple). Rood struck a balance of power shifting the fluid sheet of the metallic flag in mesmerizing formations adorned in a poncho hewn from local Punjabi Jai Mata Di prayer flags. Jai Mata Di is an ancient hail to the mother of the universe, evoked in Roods performance through her considered use of materials channelling a visual prayer for the survival and wellbeing of the rivers of Mother Earth. River Flag slowed as Rood took pause on the Khera, kneeling steadfast in a firm breeze connecting water, rock and wind.

From Market to Dumping Ground - Matheran Waste Cart Procession

From Market to Dumping Ground - Matheran Waste Cart Procession | Brydee Rood and Chiman Dangi 2015 | Site-specific Performance and Video Project at Matheran Green Festival Maharashtra India

The Matheran Waste Cart Procession was created as a direct response to the environs of Matheran - meaning "forest on the forehead" an eco sensitive Bombay Hill station “discovered by Hugh Poyntz Malet, the then district collector of Thane district in May 1850. Today Matheran is a very curious place, without modes of popular transport cars, bikes, busses... the tradition of riding by horseback, hand pulled cart or walking prevails and impacts positively on daily life, an inviting lush destination popular with visitors. On the other hand - the impacts and residues of human waste are evident throughout the delicate habitat. Plummeting breath taking views into Matheran’s green valleys are belied by accumulated carpets of thrown plastic bottles, food packets, snack plates... The evidence of a contemporary human presence carelessly left in the wake of their collective daily life. From Market to Dumping Ground - Matheran Waste Cart Procession spurred from the context of life in Matheran Hills, a performance action, which involved high-jacking a working rubbish collection cart, and honouring its workers and the process of waste collection by unfolding a series of a sacred rituals throughout the procession from the main market place to the Matheran Dumping Ground. We created garments from silver plates, leaf plates and recycled fabrics; we decorated Jharoo with gold and silver foils and ribbons, and used them like warrior’s arms or ceremonial staffs. Our heads were adorned with a crowning 3rd eye for nature something befitting the forest on the forehead and empowering the inner eco- warrior and garbage goddess queen.

Images Brydee Rood and Chiman Dangi 2015