Under Soil & Skin was a multi-channel immersive moving image installation mapped to the Mission to Seafarers iconic Norla Dome. Working with the premise of a broken chord, Australasian artist Jen Valender performed a fractured composition with a disfigured cello for the fire-damaged forests of the Blue Mountains. Under Soil & Skin reimagines troubled ecologies between human-nature relationships through ruptured song. This engagement with the landscape positions art as a regenerative navigational tool to uproot dissonance and to find the points at which harmony sits, strikes or sings. It may be read through a lens of colonisation, feminism, isolation, phenomenology, coexistence, trauma, loss, life cycles and asks: how can we face immense challenges while still remaining in tune?

On Friday 3 February the exhibition was activated by an event score. The sonic composition travelled around the dome by the command of theremin performers Vijay Thillaimuthu and Chloë Sobek.

Supported by the City of Melbourne Arts Grants and assisted by the Australian Government through the Australia Council for the Arts, its arts funding and advisory body. Produced in partnership with the Centre for Projection Art and The Mission to Seafarers.

Centre for Projection Art was delighted to support Jen Valender in the presentation of her ambitious, immersive installation artwork Under Skin & Soil exhibited at the Mission to Seafarers Norla Dome. This project saw Valender acquire new skills in sound (ambisonics) and multi-channel projection installation combined with live performance. Centre for Projection Art were thrilled to be the presenting partner for Valenders project. Through collaboration with our team artistically, curatorially and technically we developed an engaging and immersive exhibition output as part of our public program.