Shortwave

Shortwave

2 Seasons

Shortwave is an ongoing series of short film commissions, developed by the Sydney Opera House Screen Program to platform a diverse cross-section of interdisciplinary Australian artists. Each artist develops a short work which reimagines their creative relationship with film and technology.

Shortwave is presented both onsite and online as part of the annual Outlines season, a playful, provocative showcase of artists that are embracing and disrupting digital platforms and technology to imagine new forms of performance.

The 2023 commissions included work by Brad Darkson, Nasim Patel, JD Reforma, Claudia Nicholson, Riana Head-Toussaint and Feras Shaheen. Together, they presented films that spoke to the moment, channeling dance, the internet, photography, disability, artificial intelligence and and experimental film techniques.

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Shortwave
  • Shortwave: Feras Shaheen - The Bop (2023)

    Episode 1

    The Bop* is a dance film created in collaboration with the general public.

    The Bop invites the audience to engage in a task-based dance project allowing them to explore their interpretation and experimentation in a public space without diverting far from their day-to-day routines. The Bop seeks ...

  • Shortwave: Riana Head-Toussaint - Animate Loading: 3 (2023)

    Episode 2

    Animate Loading is a disability-led work that is in direct dialogue with the space it inhabits. A dynamic group of performers drawing on their diverse movement languages and embodied experiences to activate a space, bringing its seen and unseen dimensions into focus.

    First created on a rooftop c...

  • Shortwave: JD Reforma - Butterfly (2023)

    Episode 3

    JD Reforma’s Butterfly is a filmed performance that manipulates theatre as raw material. Embodied by two actresses, it pivots on the potent dynamic between the central protagonists of the stage musical, Miss Saigon and the classical opera on which it is based, Madama Butterfly. It traces the axis...

  • Shortwave: Nasim Patel - non-paradise (2023)

    Episode 4

    non-paradise is a meditation on deserts. It compares the myth of the desert as an absent place with white noise, the presence of all frequencies on a spectrum being simultaneously received by an interface. Drawing parallels between white noise and social hostilities toward the desert landscape, t...

  • Shortwave: Brad Darkson - Dream Job (2023)

    Episode 5

    Reddit: a website community for people to discuss any topic in forums called 'subreddits' or just 'subs'. In 2023 the 10th most visited website in the world.

    Antiwork: Unemployment for all, not just the rich!: a subreddit for those who want to end work, are curious about ending work, want to get...

  • Shortwave: Claudia Nicholson - The Deep Rivers Say it Slowly (2023)

    Episode 6

    The Deep Rivers Say It Slowly is a new video work by Claudia Nicholson that borrows its form from the photographic slideshow. Slipping between still and moving images, the work revisits a collection of photographs mostly taken by the artist while visiting Central and South America for the first t...