Lake Tyrrell shoot - Chloe and Grace -Developing a new dance film with Chloe Greaves and Grace Lewis
Wednesday, September 17, 2025
Monday, September 1, 2025
Recently, an old peer of mine asked if I would come to a screening of his short films and review them, ‘as if we were famous.’
I had bumped into him earlier that day on a busy city street, recognising his dark mop of curls immediately. We had gone to film school together more than a decade ago. He was one of the few people I had stayed in contact with after university, but I hadn’t seen him in years. In that time, I had had two children and gone back to study creative writing, hoping to have more luck with prose than I’d had with film.
‘Mischa!’ I called out, and after a brief but terrifying moment of startled confusion, he beamed. We greeted each other awkwardly within the flow of pedestrians. On closer inspection, his dark curls were streaked grey. I wondered if he noticed the wrinkles that betrayed my own steady creep towards forty but, as you do with peers, I just asked,
‘So, what have you up to?’
I felt the weight of the question as soon as it left my mouth – and feared it’s return.
We both replied confidently with vague answers: he was editing a feature ‘documentary thing’; I was doing a Masters ‘and writing more than ever!’ It sounded like something but felt like nothing and I was grateful the pull of the commuters urged us to move on. But as I went to say goodbye, he suggested getting a coffee, if I’d like to chat more.
Sitting down, Mischa asked if he could read anything I’d written and I had to admit that even though I was getting grades, I hadn’t actually published anything yet. Not like him, who had co-directed his debut feature film a few years ago! He blushed, seeming touched I’d known, but he lamented You Can Say Vagina hadn’t really gone anywhere after its initial screening.
And then, as you do with peers, the discussion moved to other peers: ‘Did you know Rob got into Cannes with the boat smuggler film?’ ‘And Nora’s got her feature green lit by Screen Vic.’ ‘And Andrew’s been making those short docos for Vice.’ (I may not see my old school mates anymore but I know what they are doing, on social media.)
‘What did you think of Rob’s film?’ Mischa asked.
And it was here that the conversation stalled; Oh, I hadn’t actually gone to see it.
Mischa had. He’d made a point of it. In fact, I suddenly realised, the reason we’d stayed in contact after university was because he’d come to see my short film premiere at one of Australia’s most prestigious film festivals. He’d also come to a small exhibition of random other things I’d made – set up in a friend’s loungeroom – when that award-winning documentary didn’t lead to bigger things.
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| Mischa ( left) and Siobhan ( right) in a sound mix with Lee Yee |
‘It’s strange,’ he said. ‘Why don’t we all go and see each other’s work?’
I was grateful for his philosophical rather than judgemental tone, but he didn’t know the ugly question I was asking: why do I actively avoid it?
When I got home, I googled my best guess: Comparison.
‘Social comparison theory is one explanation for [the] tendency we have to make comparisons between ourselves and others.’
Scrolling past the listicles offering Seven Ways to Stop Comparing Yourself, I was excited to find a proper psychological theory (explained simply on VeryWellMind.com)
Although we can measure some things objectively – like height or age – other things can only be understood relatively – through the process of social comparison. How people come to know themselves, I read, is largely influenced by how they compare to others. I may be ‘the funny one’ in my family but put me in another family and I might be the serious one, comparatively. This is why the top students from high school find it very disorientating when they start going to university amongst all the other school’s top students.
And, interestingly, we seem to actively try to ‘compare ourselves to those in our peer group.’
Which makes sense because the more similar someone is, the more objective the comparison feels. If I am trying to measure my ability as a filmmaker, it makes sense that I’d compare myself against those that have had the same teachers and learning opportunities – because it seems like a level playing field. So, the reason it feels so personal when a peer starts doing better than me is because their success directly highlights my lack, comparatively.
But I was surprised to read, doing this kind of ‘upward comparison’ can be adaptive: making you ‘motivated to improve upon your abilities.’ Motivated?! This is not how I experience it.
I eagerly watch a new film by a famous creative I don’t know, but when a colleague announces their screening at a top tier festival, I feel…yuck. The sensation is so sharp and disturbing in fact that I don’t even consider clicking on the link – I just ‘like’ and scroll on.
I have enough of a struggle motivating myself to create without the reminder someone else is already doing it better. Clearly my social comparison is not the healthy, adaptive type (briefly mentioned at the bottom of the article with a link to ‘self-esteem’), which is why I’ve always found solace in the popular advice to Forge Your Own Path! Run Your Own Race! For me it’s adaptive to avoid their brilliant work, right?
But, if I’m honest, it’s not just the ‘successful’ work I avoid, it’s the other stuff too – the small, local screenings or self-publications. Because (I’m embarrassed to admit) I assume it’s not that good. And why would I want to go see sub-par work?
That would be called ‘downward comparison’ and apparently it can be adaptive too: you might not be the best, the theory goes, but at least you are doing better than them. And this can motivate you to ‘keep self-improving’. But when my peers share work that isn’t threateningly successful, I scroll by just as fast. Sure, I’m ‘grateful’ but no need to go see the thing.
That night, Mischa messages me:
I would love to commission you to write a creative review on a screening Siobhan and I having. The kind of thing that would be published in a magazine or blog – if we were famous.
I pace the kitchen floor, rambling at my husband as he methodically scrubs the dishes. He’s a healthcare worker and doesn’t really understand the creative industry but I tell him about Mischa’s request because I’m excited but conflicted: excited to be approached for a ‘real’ piece of writing but scared I don’t have the time with study.
‘And because it’s a conflict of interest,’ my husband pipes in helpfully.
Damn, I hadn’t thought of that. Perhaps because I hadn’t been thinking about watching the films.
I want to write a creative review, I tell him, that uses Mischa’s screening to explore comparison in the film industry: ‘We all think we are protecting ourselves by avoiding each other’s work but ironically we are missing out on being motivated by them.’
He turns to me, confused, ‘But isn’t that what artists do, share and jam and collaborate?’
He’s been watching a lot of music documentaries about the 60s. An ‘art scene’ is what he means, and I’m taken a bit aback. I want to discuss it more but I’m self-consciously aware this is the type of discussion I should have in my own scene, if I had one.
I message Mischa and say I’m interested but will have to give it some thought. He’s delighted and sends me a link to the event.
*
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| Still from Siobhan Jackson film 1,2,3. |
The screening will be a collection of thirteen short films, duration 90 minutes:
‘Before they co-directed their 2019 indie feature, Mischa Baka and Siobhan Jackson had made numerous short films, separately.’
(I actually know Siobhan from film school too, she was one of our main tutors, a true art-house filmmaker. I was a bit jealous when I found out she’d started collaborating with Mischa, but it made sense: she'd been his supervisor when he’d stayed on to do an extra honours year and supervised him again when he’d returned to do his masters.)
The screening will be held at Thornbury Picture House. ‘One night only – $5 entry.’ There’s a lot more to read on the page but I’m struggling to concentrate – I just can’t get past the website’s amateur layout: chunks of text in different fonts with important lines bolded indiscriminately in blue or red or purple. At the top, the header is a collage of low-budget film images with the words ‘PURE SHIT’ scrawled in red over the top. PureShitAustralianCinema.com has brought up another reason I avoid seeing my peers’ work, what if it’s shit?
It’s deeply uncomfortable watching a film try hard but fail, particularly if I know the person. I feel bad for them. And then what do I say to them after?
Better to avoid and say I haven’t seen it. That’s better for everyone.
I have seen two of the thirteen short films – one I loved, one I didn’t. The rest are unknowns, but the lack of festival credits and the description as ‘refreshingly unique’ makes me nervous.
I take a closer look at the website.
In the long Mission Statement, I learn that ‘Pure Shit’ is actually meant to be tongue-in-cheek: ‘Named after Bert Deling’s incendiary 1975 feature…a great, iconic film, symbolic of a free and inventive cinema.’ Set-up and run by independent filmmaker Bill Mouloulis, the website aims to ‘promote the unique and artistic Australian films made outside the mainstream media with its institutionalised mechanisms and market philosophies.’
It’s a far more serious and passionate mission than I’d been expecting, with links to articles like ‘Upending the Canon’ and ‘Obscure But Worthy Films’. Looking at the website now I understand the amateur aesthetic as defiantly punk.
Back on the screening page, I scroll down to the chunk of prose I’d dismissed. It’s a review of the films by Bill:
‘Mischa Baka's work is quite distinct from Jackson's…Baka loves the human body and elicits great natural but physical performances from his actors (Ã la Cassavetes). The editing in these films is always surprising and innovative…’
He’s looked at the films individually and as a body of work. He’s described both their work with earnest attention. He’s written about them as if they were famous. And, for the first time, I feel excited to see the films.
But, I also wonder, why does Mischa need me?
Which is what I ask him when we meet up.
I’d warned him over email that I couldn’t ethically do a commissioned review and I pitched the idea of taking a slightly different meta angle. But, sitting in a quiet café now, watching him finish a hot chocolate while I prattle on about myself for five-minutes, I admit it’s not really what he asked for.
‘And,’ I add, ‘have you see Bill’s write-up for the screening? It’s wonderful and already does what you want.’ I go on to tell him how I love Pure Shit and how it’s challenging the too narrow, mainstream idea of ‘great cinema’.
Mischa smiles and says he loves Bill’s ideals too, and all that he’s doing to elevate unrecognised films and filmmakers. ‘But,’ he says, ‘some of the things he screens really are shit,’ and he laughs nervously. ‘But I kind of like that too.’
Now I’m confused about what he wants when he says ‘famous’. Mischa thinks.
‘What I loved about film school,’ he finally says, ‘was that we all knew each other’s work so well: its concerns, its style, its failings. In the hallways, we pulled them apart and discussed them the way we might talk about an American block buster.’ He laughs nervously again, ‘Or perhaps I’m just pining for the old-days and can’t grow up and join the industry.’
I can see he fears my judgement, but I’m actually struck by how different our reasons were for going back to study: He’d gone back for the attentive community, I’d gone back to get better at storytelling, to master storytelling, to get so skilled that I would make something good enough to be accepted into an attentive community. But I knew what he meant. I loved those serious hallway conversations too, I could do that.
*
The night of the screening and I’m feeling very nervous. Although I know it won’t be a massive turnout, it’s hit me there be will people I know, and then the inevitable question: ‘So, what have you been up to?’
As I change my outfit for the third time, I run through my accomplishments, but they feel small. Excuses start to creep in: I’m tired. I’m not prepared. The weather might turn.
If I didn’t have to go, I probably wouldn’t.
I get there early. The cinema lobby is beautiful: dimly lit with art deco lighting, a small bar, teal velvet seats and varnished wood. I find a spot in the corner and pull out my notebook. As people arrive, I jot down my observations and my nerves settle with my reviewer’s hat squarely on. The people gather in groups and the small room fills with a hum of conversation. But, I realise, I can’t see anyone I know. None of our peers have come.
Some bells trill – the screening will be starting soon – and I quickly scribble the film titles in my notebook with room for notes when I’m bumped from behind.
‘Oh, excuse me!’ says a cheery, middle-aged woman that I recognise immediately. It’s my old screenwriting teacher. But when I say enthusiastically greet her I can tell she can’t remember me.
‘Kelly Hucker,’ I say, ‘I had you in 2010.’
‘Oh yes, of course,’ she says uncertainly but I steal myself for what’s coming next. But she doesn’t ask what I’ve been up to, which feels worse. The screening bell trills again and I’m grateful to in.
Waiting in our seats ,there is a nervous tension, or maybe it’s just me. Mischa and Siobhan came in last and are sitting in the front row. A man gets up and introduces the films – this must be Bill. It’s a short welcome, upbeat and grateful for everyone coming out to watch ‘this amazing body of work.’
We erupt into applause, and someone whistles as the lights dim. But the screen remains blank. From the darkness, Siobhan calls out: ‘Just a warning, they might not be that amazing!’
A big, warm laugh fills the space. I know that laughter, it’s one of relief. Usually I’d appreciate this lowering of expectation too, if I was worrying about them, or me, but I’m not.
The screen starts to flicker and the music rises. My notebook remains unopened on my lap.
After the screening, I stand in the lobby and try to get down some of my racing thoughts, but I can’t help overhearing the conversation from the group of young people standing beside me. They are university students – Siobhan probably invited them. They stand in a circle, arms crossed, and exchange reflections on the films. The one with the donkey, they all agree, was great, strong performances and cinematography. But the one about the insecure father, ‘I don’t know if he had control over that one, it felt forced.’ And they all nod in agreement. The responses are astute, one’s I agree with, but the cool tone and analytical confidence is something I also recognise too. And with that they’re off, heading for the exit and straight past Mischa and Siobhan. It makes me feel…yuck but there is no time to dwell – because I am bursting to talk to them. Desperate to discuss the films, the parts that stirred me and inspired me and confused me. I had forgotten how much I loved film, the possibility to see the world through someone else’s eyes.
And as we talk and argue and compliment and dismiss and re-evaluate, the crowd thins out. Soon there is just the three of us. What my husband might call an ‘art scene.’
Kelly Hucker is an award-winning filmmaker, emerging writer and occasional artist based in Naarm (Melbourne, Australia). - kellyhucker.com
“Unknown Pleasures”
Tuesday, July 26, 2022, 8:30 pm
Short films by Mischa Baka & Siobhan Jackson (2007–2020, ~90 mins)
Q&A with Baka & Jackson, moderated by Anna Helme (VCA Lecturer & moving image artist)
Thornbury Picture House, 802 High St., Thornbury
Sunday, October 13, 2024
F Projects Residency, Warrnambool
Leaving Melbourne, I ventured to the F Projects Residency in Warrnambool with a longing for space—both physically and mentally. A coastal residency away from the city was a chance to breathe, but it was also a personal investigation. I grew up in Pearl Beach, a small town near Sydney. I associated Pearl Beach with an idealised, vague and half imagined vision of an artistic haven: artists and creatives forming a community by the coast, collaborating, sharing, and living with the landscape. Over the decades, Pearl Beach had shifted, becoming a haven for holiday-goers rather than artists, and I hoped to rediscover that creative ideal in Warrnambool. Or at least be disappointed and rage against the inadequacy of Australia.
When I arrived, Helen and Dez Bunyon welcomed me at the train station and took me to the residency space—an old morgue. It is a large, slightly divided building, with one side outfitted for living and the other filled with studios. As I settled in, I met Harley Manifold, a local artist who has a studio in the residency building. Harley is kind, welcoming, and was quick to invite me and the other arriving artist, Amy Meng to dinner, his treat! We learned about his life as a full-time artist.
The next day, I explored Warrnambool. The town was larger than Pearl Beach. I wandered down to the beach and explored the foreshore and its slightly scungy camp ground and wayward walking tracks - a lost bong bottle and old chip packets a sign of genuine habitation. There was a tinge of bittersweet nostalgia as I thought about how my own hometown had changed—driven by trophy beach mansions, losing its community touch.
There is a small gallery affiliated with F Projects. There, Amy Meng, Kazumasa Tanaka ( an artist from Japan) and I were invited to an exhibition where locals gathered to appreciate the art. There was a sense of togetherness, something that echoed the artistic community I vaguely remembered from my childhood.
Throughout the residency, small moments reinforced this community spirit. Locals would visit the studios, bringing baked goods and working on their projects side by side, while we chatted and shared creative processes. We met Jane Curtis, who lives next door and is involved in looking after the residency. Jane is an artist herself, her work adorning the walls of the residency with works by Des Bunyon and Helen Bunyun. Dez was focusing on printmaking, and I saw some of his beautiful landscapes and sketches, for planned etchings. Helen’s work, ( as seen mostly on instagram) which reminds me of Robert Klippel’s industrial aesthetic with the charm of Shaun Tan, was partly constructed from found objects. Harley’s practice is reminiscent for me of Jeffrey Smart with more neon.
During our time at the residency, Kaz, Amy, and I started cooking and sharing meals together. Kaz, whose conceptual work focused on community and politics, explored Warrnambool by creating graphite impressions of local textures. A large impression of a local police memorial had him covering it in paper and rubbing it all over. Amy draws from Kawaii Japanese culture, blending cuteness with a hidden, darker edge. One of her masks became a welcome wearable artwork, suggesting our own Kawaii club. As for me, I was drawn back to the landscape—something that had always fascinated me. Growing up on the coast, I often explored hidden natural gardens, pathways, coves and caves, and I was eager to rediscover that sense of adventure in Warrnambool.
Rebekah Stuart joined me, and together we explored the town’s landscapes, creating a dance film. I also worked partly on a narrative film based on Henry James’ Wings of the Dove with some friends who visited, integrating the landscape of Warrnambool into our evolving screenplay. Jane and the F projects were so accommodating and easy going with this last minute invitation to my friends, my sense of possibility felt wholly nurtured.
One memorable encounter was with M.P. Willis, a local with deep Aboriginal ties to the land. He spoke to us about the history of Warrnambool, his grandmother's tribal connections, the lands utilization in horse training, farming and industry, and the environmental damage that had followed. His stories of the landscape’s transformation resonated with Rebkah and I, adding impetus to the dramatic choreography in our dance film.
Over the course of the residency, we also visited the homes and studios of other local artists in the wider area, like Harley’s mother, Marion Manifold who took us on a tour of her large historical house and garden. It was a rare glimpse into a personal art collection in situ—the kind of art pieces that might never make it into galleries but harkened back to her art school days, creative experiments or a more provocative intention. Her more current prints were large beautiful arrays of plants and landscape with bold lines and patterns. I loved all her work and could see a through line between her work and Harleys, a reverence for places and things that have weathered into and integrated into the landscape.
Kaz, Amy, and I had the pleasure of visiting Carol Eagle at her home with Helen, Dez and Marion, stepping into a labyrinth of curated rooms, each filled with dolls from around the world. Some of the dolls were Carol’s own creations, and after exploring her collection, she treated us to lunch with desserts, sandwiches, and more desserts. We visited her studio, where Carol meticulously crafted each doll, shaping their faces, hands, and bodies before dressing them in elaborate garments. Her daughter and husband shared their own passion for collecting glassware and gardening. The entire house was a fairy tale, a place where the dolls might come to life. I think Amy Kawaii's obsession resonated, a twinkle in her eye.
Another memorable experience during our visit to the Manifold Estate with Marian was hearing the story of her husband and son, Harley, landing their light plane in a large mudflat and getting stuck. The story unfolded when we questioned a comedic sketch of her husband stuck in the plane amidst the mudflat—a lighthearted piece that stood out against the otherwise refined art and decor of her home. Marian recounted the tale of their misadventure. Later, this same story was shared again, but from a different perspective. At a separate dinner, Jane Curtis detailed her fathers part in rescuing Marian’s husband from the swamp. Jane also shared beautiful passages from her fathers book that spoke of their connection in feeling the poetry and beauty of the land.
Des Bunyan is part of a weekly FProject Cinema group run in a small local hall, which he has helped outfit with a projector, screen, and speakers with contributing funds from the Fproject. Each week, they showcase a selected film, and sometimes community members share personal connections to the movies shown. Des screened one of my own short films before a feature. Later, Jane Curtis shared her thoughts on my film, engaging with the character dynamics and psychological themes. Rather than focusing on technical aspects, she delved into the film's relationships and inquiries, something I appreciated.
My time at F Projects Residency reaffirmed my belief that coastal towns can still hold vibrant artistic communities. While my hometown had changed, ( the only local shop and cafe had closed for lack of a local community in the off season) Warrnambool offered a glimpse of what I thought I’d lost—an artistic haven where creativity, community, and the landscape came together.
Tuesday, June 13, 2023
Stuart, in the furnace of all her agitation and fury at the past few years, has managed to forge a utopia. These are atmospheric works, with moody skies, cresting waves, oceanic mists, and verdant, sun-lit waterholes. They are familiar, but they are also untouched. I think of the Night’s Plutonian shores that Edgar Allen Poe dreamed of. I think of Jupiter and her ninety-five moons, and also another poem, but I forget the author, who wrote that the sky above is an aerial ocean. In the thick throng of the crowd I bump into people trying to get closer. Someone sits down to get a better view. Someone else stands on their tip toes. I smell breath and perfume and the wool of the person’s coat beside me. We are clustered lemmings about to fall.
Let’s talk about place. Let’s talk about the artists role as navigator, as tour guide, as developer. Stuart is well versed in traversing inner landscapes before translating them two dimensionally. In this exhibition, she has sliced tiny slivers of intergalactic, otherworldly planes and pressed them between two pieces of borosilicate glass for us to contemplate. Stuart says this work came from an inner craving to understand the minutiae and magnitude of the world around her and to envision a pre-colonised land. Orison was made with urgency during the pandemic, growing alongside her search for home, while she uprooted herself from the city and attempted to resettle up North. But Neptune could never. Stuart has created a counterpart to earth. She has unpicked the fabric of time and space and pushed us through to another side, and we can only thank her.
She has unpicked the fabric of time and space and pushed us through to another side, and we can only thank her.
Marina Abramović says that in a city, the people are the nature. Three dancers including Stuart, walk into the space and stand in front of the window facing the crater. Clad in pale things, floaty garments, loose hair and barefoot, they are wide-eyed and lucid as if just born in the next room. Aliens. Creatures. They begin to move in and around each other. It is a dance, but it is also a reassembling. It is a dance, but it is also a hatching. Stuart leads the dancers deeper into the space to stand in front of her beautiful portals. The creatures become gargoyles, sentients to the landscapes they now block. They are trolls that dare us to cross. The crowd transforms again from moths to water, and the tide of bodies retreat to allow the three to move. And how do you write about movement and art? What do three beings look like in a dystopian coin cage in the guts of the city? Can dancers turn from guard dogs to oceans to sediment, churning? I would have to say yes. Washed out. Panting. Weathered. Barking. Sliding around on the fucking wood floor. Collapsed. They are together as one and then they are spread apart. Legs as arms and arms as heads. This is not the first time Stuart has done this.
There is something a little alchemical in what good artists do. They don’t just reference the past or future but rather bend everything that has ever existed sideways, until it all cracks open. They eat whatever flows from that space, chew it, and then spit it into the mouth of the viewer. Mother bird, baby bird. Initiated by the performance, we are ready to leave our mortal plane and transport into the worlds of Orison. Words leave me for dead, and only another borrowed line from a poem comes to mind, this one by Robert Macfarlane in which he has the forest talking to time. Year, year fledge me a jay, and the year (Stuart in this case) responds, I will fledge you a jay that will plant you a thousand acorns that will each grow a thousand oaks that will each live a thousand years that will each fledge a bright-backed, blue-winged, forest-making Jay.
In her artist statement, Stuart says Orison is born from discomfort, displacement and inner agitation. She mined herself for sadness and anger, pulled each thread of feeling until she made art that functions as a memory of home. Stuart has distilled the peace of being in the natural world in this unnatural environment. In a closed space, filled with people desperate to see, she has cut windows for us all.
Ella Baxter, a writer and artist, has released her debut novel, New Animal, in Australia, the UK, US, and France. Her second book, "Woo Woo," is scheduled for release next year: Website
30 May – 10 June 2023
fortyfivedownstairs, 45 Flinders lane, Melbourne, 3000, Australia
Sunday, September 25, 2022
A photograph for Deans show: The Buffel Harvest
rom artist Dean West, The Buffel Harvest is an experimental performance orbiting around a live demonstration of how to grow Oyster Mushrooms using Central Australian weed species Buffel Grass as a substrate. The demonstration takes you through harvest, pasteurisation, inoculation, incubation and finally harvest again. The demonstration is accompanied by projected videos, talks from experts and a sonic score composed and performed by Luiz Gubeissi.
