This is Barbara Cleveland – Kate Blackmore

— About

Kate Blackmore is an Australian artist and filmmaker whose films have been presented across cinematic, broadcast and contemporary art contexts. She has written, directed and produced over 25 short documentaries about art and culture for the Australian Broadcasting Corporation, including The Art of Collecting and the Walkley Award nominated series The Movement. In 2018, Blackmore was awarded the Hive commission to create The Woman and The Car, a hybrid documentary about iconic Australian artist Margaret Dodd. The film was produced by Bridget Ikin (Felix Media) and financed by Adelaide Film Festival, Screen Australia and the Australian Broadcasting Corporation. Blackmore’s narrative short films have screened at the Sydney Film Festival in 2021 and 2023 (Dendy Awards).

In 2024, Blackmore began production on her debut feature documentary, Make it Look Real, produced by Bethany Bruce (Staple Fiction) and Daniel Joyce (Projector Films). The film follows an intimacy coordinator on her quest to change the way sex scenes are created. Make it Look Real was supported in development by Screen Australia, Create NSW and the SAFC and was selected for the inaugural Doc Society New Perspectives Pitch Lab, and the Sunny Side of the Doc Global Pitch 2021. The film is represented by Autlook Film Sales.

Blackmore is a founding member of the acclaimed artist collective Barbara Cleveland whose works have been included in notable exhibitions including, Know My Name, NGA, Canberra (2021); Divided Worlds, Adelaide Biennial of Australian Art, Adelaide (2018); Unboxed: Artists and the Archive, Hayward Gallery, London (2017); Today Tomorrow Yesterday, MCA, Sydney (2017); Bodies in Time, Australian Contemporary Art Commission, AGNSW, Sydney (2016); The future is already here, 20th Biennale of Sydney, Sydney (2016); and Contemporary Australia: Women, QAGOMA, Brisbane (2012). Barbara Cleveland’s work is included in Australian public collections including the Art Gallery of New South Wales, Sydney; Queensland Art Gallery | Gallery of Modern Art, Brisbane; Museum of Contemporary Art, Sydney; and Monash University Museum of Art, Melbourne. The collective is represented by Sullivan+Strumpf, Sydney.

Blackmore holds a BFA/BA (Hons) Moving Image & Performance from UNSW Art & Design, Sydney and a MA Visual and Media Anthropology from Freie Universität, Berlin. She works as a Sessional Academic in Moving Image at UNSW Art & Design and a Lecturer in Documentary at AFTRS, Sydney.

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This is Barbara Cleveland

THIS IS BARBARA CLEVELAND (2013)

Concept, Direction and Performance Barbara Cleveland (Frances Barrett, Kate Blackmore, Kelly Doley, Diana Smith)
Sound & Video Elliot Hughes
Editor Kate Blackmore
Composer Lucy Phelan

Single Channel Video Installation, 17mins

This project was commissioned by Performance Space for their 40th anniversary exhibition ‘You’re History’ in 2013, with support from the Australian Government through the Australia Council, its arts funding and advisory body.

This is Barbara Cleveland is the second in a series of works exploring the life and legacy of the mythic performance artist Barbara Cleveland. During a brief period from the late 1970s to the early 1980s, Cleveland is said to have produced a series of provocative, implicitly feminist performances before disappearing under mysterious circumstances.

This is Barbara Cleveland takes as its starting point Cleveland’s 1980 performance – A lecture on Everything and Nothing. The artists re-enact this text and re-stage a series of 1970s performances, as well as reflecting on Cleveland’s position in Australian art history. Here Cleveland’s story becomes a way to explore a series of broader themes: the legacies of ephemeral art and feminist histories, the complex status of the performance trace, and questions of authorship and authenticity.