Born in ASU – Meteor Theatre 2002

   |   Meeting place / Huihuinga   |   Moving Image   |   

Born in the ASU was one of those things where you wished you’d been part of making but hadn’t. Instead you considered yourself lucky to walk out of a rainy Waikato winter’s night and into a guided tour where you were told that if you wandered off the paths the guide “would not be responsible.”

At a time when the world had become terrified by terror there was a sense of sanity when you walked in through the doors. Here was world class alternative theatre right on the doorstep. It was organised by the usual suspects of the independent scene at the time — Mark Servian, Sandra Jensen, Alec Forbes, Emit Snake-Beings, Adrian Holroyd, just to name a few. They were our unsung heroes, the liberators of our minds, the ones that reminded us that pax Americana was part of the social imaginary and we their unwitting stooges on the other side of the planet.

RESEARCHER

Joe Citizen

Researcher
Wintec

I believe that theory should inform practice and practice should inform theory - that's why I think that the Media Arts degree is one of the best in the country. If you want to write about the arts then go to University, if you want to work at the bottom of your field then do a short industry course, but if you want to take control of your own learning, come here. Both industry and critical thinking skills are provided, because it is creative, technical and reflective practice that makes a Media Artist stand out from the crowd.

As both a graduate and post-graduate of Media Arts, I'm someone that wants to be relevant, up-to-date and well informed. My fields of teaching encompass both the moving image and contemporary art and media theory domains.

I've always got something on the go because there's a lot going on in Hamilton. An example of this is the DVD It Came From The Swamp,which is a compilation of Hamilton short films I put together and toured round the country. Every single one of those films represents large groups of people, from every sector of the creative business spectrum. Just as I'm finishing one, another one pops up.