Diffability, belonging, and empowerment.
To the casual observer, artists Natalie Jurrjens and Eden Menta are strong and fearless individuals, which belies their deep sensitivity, vulnerability, and boundless humanity.
The Australian Centre for Contemporary Art (ACCA) posed big questions for their 2021/22 major research project, 'Who's Afraid of Public Space?'. Arts Project Australia (APA) and Mikaela Stafford invited Melbourne-based artists Natalie Jurrjens and Eden Menta to collaborate and respond to APA's project To the Streets by thinking about visibility, access, and inclusion in public spaces. Over a short period of time in 2021, during lockdown and post-lockdown, the artists went on a journey of discovery about public spaces, their values and each other.
The artists talked extensively about what was important when considering 'public space'—who should access it, feel safe and welcome. The answer would always circle back to 'everyone'. They discussed their concerns about exclusion tokenism, as well as their values around inclusion, culture, diversity, queerness, diffability, and First Nations people, acknowledging that the project would unfold and be situated on unceded lands.
For their collaborative photography project, Natalie and Eden wanted to include everyone so that, importantly, no one encountering the work would feel excluded, no matter who they are. Conversations that ensued were passionate, complex, and revealing. With the best intentions in mind, communications occasionally broke down and opinions became momentarily lost in translation. The artists wanted to produce a perfect artwork that belonged within the streets of Collingwood—an artwork that was inclusive, meaningful, and respectful—where people who call Collingwood home would see themselves reflected.
“Everyone should feel included no matter who they are. We all live on this planet together. Live and let live.” —Eden Menta
However, as we emerged from lockdown, this ideal was challenging. People had materialised from their homes fragile, and with frayed emotions. It was harder than usual in a Covid world to engage friends and the broader community in a creative project that sought to bring groups of strangers together. Highly values-driven, Natalie and Eden didn’t want to put something they had created into the world that made anyone feel they weren't seen or represented.
Paste-up in the back streets of Collingwood, of Eden and Natalie's artwork.
What resulted was an artwork that avoids creating an image of a public space ‘utopia'. Instead, it presents a window into a person's lived experience of public spaces, inviting the viewer to see, feel and experience what it is like to be in the milieu of public space from the perspective of a person with an invisible diffability. Confronting the viewer in the image foreground is a young person, the artist, represented in colour and standing uneasily, hesitant and anxious. They are supported by a loved one also in colour, their mother, whose gaze and reassuring touch keep them grounded and safe while the people in the background, represented in black and white, swirl and blur around the central figures.
When you grow up, you realise your differences are what make you special. —Natalie Jurrjens
The artwork reflects the complex nature of how the lived experience of public spaces can feel for someone with an invisible diffability: entering a crowded space, public, familiar or otherwise, can be anxiety and fear-inducing. These feelings can amplify for people with autism or other diffabilities, especially when they encounter new spaces where they might feel unsafe or where they don't see themselves reflected. Seen from this perspective and in this context, Eden Menta and Natalie Jurrjens’ artwork Opening Our Eyes is frightening, liberating and empowering all at once.
Sim Luttin, Project Curator, December 2021
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Originally published online in 2022, for the exhibition TO THE STREET, a collaborative project between ACCA and Arts Project Australia as part of ACCA’s 2021/22 major research project, 'Who's Afraid of Public Space?'.
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Artwork
Eden Menta & Natalie Jurrjens
Opening Our Eyes, 2021
digital print banner
237.8 cm x 420.5 cm
Installations
IRL > Cnr Smith St & Sackville St , Collingwood, 4 Dec 2021 - 29 Jan 2022
Virtual > QR Code, Cnr Smith St & Sackville St, Collingwood, 4 Dec 2021 - 20 Mar 2022