A Message From the Architect, Harrison.
This ‘larger than life’ bee is part of a series of nature-based art installations and projects orchestrated by singer/songwriter, Toni Childs. During Toni’s career, her songs and associated visuals always featured motifs of animals, conservation and human connection to nature.
‘The Bee’ is a prototype for a mass-produced version to be assembled by communities around Australia, using the joining strategies similar to a flat pack 3-D puzzle. The scale of ‘The Bee’ allows and encourages people to walk inside and observe it from all angles. Toni believes that part of the reason we tend to forget about bees and other vital pollinators is their size. In our everyday experience, she thinks we very much take bees for granted. By making ‘The Bee’ into a pavilion, we are confronted with the animal’s beauty. The beauty is presented in an intentional larger than life way to highlight their importance on Earth.
Toni reached out to her long term friend, Jo Gillies (of Archisoul Architects) to help with design and advise in the construction of ‘The Bee’. A recent graduate of architecture and aspiring designer Harrison Dumesich (Me!) was appointed to Toni. ‘The Bee’ here today is just the beginning of the design and a work in progress, as Toni is an artist that loves the process of ideation and execution and doesn’t shy away from a challenge.
About Bee Friendly
‘The Bee’ featured is the prototype for a further 30 bees, each at 8.5m long and to be installed in regional Australian towns by the end of 2022. There will be three months of bee centric activities while 300,000 silkworms weave the skin of the 30 giant bees.
Toni’s ambitious Bee Friendly installation is the first of two installation components from her new show ‘It’s All a Beautiful Noise’. Her new show is playful and engaging that will provide four months of audience engagement (before, during and after the show).
In Toni’s words, “I have a new show called, It’s All a Beautiful Noise (IAABN). IAABN is two hours of my music, off-the-hook 3D mapping animation, live-action footage, storytelling and a lot of high-tech audience engagement that will tour into 30 regional towns and cities”.
She hopes to begin touring her new show in early 2023.
Toni has been following the declining populations of bees for some time. Around the world, they are disappearing, with their immune systems being severely compromised by chemicals and lack of foraging. Toni was inspired to create a groundswell of support for these mighty pollinators who are the real rockstars of the planet.
By creating spectacle community experiences, Toni hopes to spark conversations that aim to save the bees. Questions will be raised about bee sustainability, which encourages viewers to think critically about these endangered creatures.
The Show
The ‘Bee Friendly’ installation is something that you will be able to walk inside. The wooden frame will be covered by an estimated 9500 silkworms across the 30 bees.
The ‘BIG IDEA Project’ will also be launched. This project offers a community-wide conversation about steps we can take to help the pollinator species. It features lectures, documentaries, plantings with seed- paper-making workshops, cooking classes and backyard beekeeping workshops.
On show night, each audience member is given one of six paper masks of pollinators. Each mask has an addressable LED light that Toni will control from the stage. At the end show, the audience will be invited to go on an online treasure hunt and when they move into the lobby, they will be greeted by local beekeepers. Here, the beekeepers can engage with the audience and share their ideas for a Bee-Friendly world.
After the show, each audience member will be asked to send their mask to a physical location. From there, all the masks in Australia will be put into one giant installation, making a big beautiful noise for our pollinators and allowing audience members to participate in a national community art project.
A Message From Toni
Personally, I would like to make the bee a protected species. If we protect the bee, we protect all the pollinators, and we defend ourselves.
In 2018, I created a ‘Year of the Bee’, beekeepers Survey with Laree Thorsby and then-Secretary of Brisbane Beekeepers Association – Elise Whittaker, daughter of biosecurity officer, Peter Warhurst, former president of Brisbane Beekeepers Association and author of ‘The Bee Book’. Our aim was to bring backyard beekeepers and commercial beekeepers to get her to start a big bee-friendly conversation.
In 2019 my touring company, Big Mother Touring Company Pty Ltd, launched itself for the first time with a very successful Toni Childs Retrospective Tour – celebrating the 30th anniversary of my seminal album ‘Union’ at 57 theatres across regional Australia. Laree and I hosted beekeeper breakfasts in almost every regional town on tour – inviting beekeepers to participate in conversations with each other and complete the survey. I photographed and interviewed them to find out their thoughts on the state of the bee species in Australia, with the possibility of producing a documentary and/or photo book.
I wanted to let beekeepers know about my upcoming show and the tsunami of goodwill for the bee that will be generated so they can explore the best way to utilise the exposure collectively.
