softwash was an artist-led program of experimental, site-responsive live art presented on Bundjalung Country | Tweed Heads. Across three free events, softwash reimagined the public parklands at the Tweed Regional Museum Learning Site as a place for artists and community to gather, share and make meaning together.
Facilitated by artist collective, PUBLIC PALACE (Laurie Oxenford, Grace Dewar and Merinda Davies), softwash supported 30 artists to make site responsive new work in public space. These commissions were presented over three informal gatherings featuring performance, visual arts, sound, writing, socially-engaged practice, workshops and reading club.
︎230 Kennedy Dr, Tweed Heads West NSW 2485
SW_001 – Full Foam Rinse and Spin | 2–6PM, Saturday 30 August 2025
Full Foam Rinse and Spin is a frothy, fizzing, fun fair born out of temporary conditions and foamy friendship on muddy, salty riverbank. What can be generated with the right conditions? All aboard the BBQ boat!
Featuring: Mark Cora, Sarah Poulgrain, Artist Boardriders Club, Adrienne Kenafake, Holiday Makers, Lewis and Julie McLaren.
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SW_002 – Eating Together | 2–6PM, Saturday 27 September 2025
Eating Together called on shared languages, systems, rituals, structures and processes to realise the conditions of our continued togetherness on the night of a Waxing Gibbous moon. Offering the provocation of opening borders between people, softwash presented socially-engaged, participatory live artworks that offer new / rebirthed ways of being in relation to each other.
Featuring: Deirdre Currie, Jason King, Betty Russ and Michael Donnelly, Kuweni Dias Mendis, Glenn Barry, Marilena Hewitt, Kyra Togo, Ellamay Fitzgerald and Lora Ward.
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SW_003 – At the Water's Edge | 2–6PM, Saturday 8 November 2025
At the Water's Edge took us outside to the wet spaces; a multispecies entanglement, a loosening of binary thought, a soaking, leaking, melting of our edges. With a focus on queer ecology and an interest in building practices of interdependence. Tending to connections, between the socio-eco-political in devotion to the practices of listening, caring, queering, and decentralising.
Featuring: Erica Eurell, Norton Fredericks, Tay Haggarty, Ruby Donohue, Anna Whitaker, Kinly Grey, Kimberly Stokes and Hannah Bronte.
View the softwash archive on Substack and Instagram.
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This program has been assisted by the Australian Government through Creative Australia, with auspicing from The FARM, development support from the City of Gold Coast and venue support from Tweed Regional Museum and Arts Northern Rivers.
Photography and design by Marilena Hewitt.
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Facilitated by artist collective, PUBLIC PALACE (Laurie Oxenford, Grace Dewar and Merinda Davies), softwash supported 30 artists to make site responsive new work in public space. These commissions were presented over three informal gatherings featuring performance, visual arts, sound, writing, socially-engaged practice, workshops and reading club.
︎230 Kennedy Dr, Tweed Heads West NSW 2485
SW_001 – Full Foam Rinse and Spin | 2–6PM, Saturday 30 August 2025
Full Foam Rinse and Spin is a frothy, fizzing, fun fair born out of temporary conditions and foamy friendship on muddy, salty riverbank. What can be generated with the right conditions? All aboard the BBQ boat!
Featuring: Mark Cora, Sarah Poulgrain, Artist Boardriders Club, Adrienne Kenafake, Holiday Makers, Lewis and Julie McLaren.
︎
SW_002 – Eating Together | 2–6PM, Saturday 27 September 2025
Eating Together called on shared languages, systems, rituals, structures and processes to realise the conditions of our continued togetherness on the night of a Waxing Gibbous moon. Offering the provocation of opening borders between people, softwash presented socially-engaged, participatory live artworks that offer new / rebirthed ways of being in relation to each other.
Featuring: Deirdre Currie, Jason King, Betty Russ and Michael Donnelly, Kuweni Dias Mendis, Glenn Barry, Marilena Hewitt, Kyra Togo, Ellamay Fitzgerald and Lora Ward.
︎
SW_003 – At the Water's Edge | 2–6PM, Saturday 8 November 2025
At the Water's Edge took us outside to the wet spaces; a multispecies entanglement, a loosening of binary thought, a soaking, leaking, melting of our edges. With a focus on queer ecology and an interest in building practices of interdependence. Tending to connections, between the socio-eco-political in devotion to the practices of listening, caring, queering, and decentralising.
Featuring: Erica Eurell, Norton Fredericks, Tay Haggarty, Ruby Donohue, Anna Whitaker, Kinly Grey, Kimberly Stokes and Hannah Bronte.
View the softwash archive on Substack and Instagram.
︎
This program has been assisted by the Australian Government through Creative Australia, with auspicing from The FARM, development support from the City of Gold Coast and venue support from Tweed Regional Museum and Arts Northern Rivers.
Photography and design by Marilena Hewitt.
