Firstly, massive congratulations on Biennale 2008. What a sumptuous & provocative feast you have provided & like that advertisement on TV where the uninitiated is firmly slapped on both cheeks into awareness. Can I ever look at my world through bored eyes again.

Highlights for me were Cockatoo Island & its ambience & potential to foster rebellion. Also enjoyed the interactive opportunity with Ross Gibson at the Gallery of NSW.

However… the major application of the art selected seems to be in paradoxing the viewer. Now while, as reported, that has an awakening effect on the viewer, I’m unaware, OR didn’t find any art that sought to empower the viewer/participant into revolutionary action on their own behalf. In theatre there’s a main stream convention of performers entertaining/informing an appreciative audience… much more personally beneficial is interactive theatre where the edge between audience & performer, is transactional.

I would like to have seen much more ” Guerilla-styled theatre” in which performers interact & skillfully & fruitfully provoke “audience’ into action & expression. Example; I left the Gallery of NSW & headed across the road for a coffee from the takeaway booth in the Domain. There i was fascinated to find a good-looking & apparently drunk & homeless person hitting on a very attractive young lady. She managed to be respectful, focused & left promptly, alone, with her purchase. The effect on Kiosk staff & patrons of this urine-drenched young man was uncomfortably real.

It strikes me that revolution, the theme you have put forward, is traditionally hatched indoors, but enacted out in the streets, by those marginalised & ” revolting”. How do I get to sew proposals into the next Biennale? I have 20 years street theatre experience, Dip/Dram/arts etc…where do i enlist? bring on the soapboxes…