HERE & THERE / Alex Karaconji & Daniel Elliott
Curated by Belinda Yee
Two animated works, two artists and two cities, connected by a single projection event. A collaborative project by Tamworth Regional Gallery and DRAW Space, Sydney.
Two animated works are presented simultaneously in regional NSW and inner city Sydney, connecting Tamworth Regional Gallery’s outdoor projection space with DRAW Space gallery. Sydney artist Alex Karaconji’s Letter #1 brings the intimacy and looseness of a letter into stop-motion animation, while Armidale-based artist Daniel Elliott’s Shits for the Birds drifts through the soft atmospheres of regional life at dawn. Together, the works trace the strange poetry of local streets, overlooked places, birds, weather, infrastructure and the small gestures that bind people to place. Presented across two locations at once, the project opens a quiet conversation between city and country, distance and closeness, here and there.
There is no opening night for this event.
The projected works will feature at DRAW Space over these nights: Sunday 21, Monday 22 and Tuesday 23 June, 2026.
Alex Karaconji
Artist Statement
Letter #1 is an attempt to capture the intimacy and breezy open-form of a letter, using a medium - stop-motion animation - that often demands the opposite. It is addressed to a friend.
Biography
Alex Karaconji is a visual artist who lives and works on Gadigal land (Sydney). His practice includes painting, animation, and comics, which he employs to reveal the intimacy, pathos, and humour of everyday life. His work has featured several times in the Australian International Animation Festival, and he has been a finalist in the Dobell Prize. He was also included in the curated exhibition From Here to There: Australian Art and Walking at Lismore Regional Gallery. His work is a part of private and public art collections including Artbank and City of Sydney
Web - alexkaraconji.com
Daniel Elliott
Artist Statement
Regional living? That shit’s for the birds. I mean, I personally love it. I’m out documenting my life in the country at 5:30am every morning, but while people who don’t live in regional areas probably imagine golden sunrises and singing birds (and we definitely get those), the quiet calm of the early morning also makes it easy to notice a world that’s slowly in decline.
What was once critical transport infrastructure is left to rust, shopping trolleys are strewn kilometres from their homes because there are no supermarkets near the poorer parts of town, and those trolleys almost always end up in the creek courtesy of bored teenagers during the night. Some results of this decline can be quirky and fun, abandoned homes in the middle of town with alpacas wandering around inside them, or mowing your lawn while sheep angrily stomp their feet on the other side of the fence, creating this strange feeling of two different eras colliding. But a lot of it just feels sad.
And yet, amongst all of it, there are always the birds. They can fly away, go wherever they want, but they choose to stay here. They seem to love it, and so do I.
Shits for the Birds started out as two photography projects. One was called Morning Chorus, where I documented the local currawong and crow populations I encountered on my morning walks. I’ve always been fascinated by the strange line where nature merges with what mankind has created, and I can’t think of a better symbol of that than the silhouettes of birds perched on TV antennas, power lines, and streetlights against the morning light.
The other project was simply titled Trolley Town, documenting shopping trolleys in places they absolutely don’t belong. I often found myself wondering how they ended up where they were. If only trolleys could talk, I’m sure they’d have some stories. They might even enjoy their adventures away from the supermarkets, even if they do become eyesores in the process.
I’ve used many of these photos as references for the illustrations in this animation project. I think these two very different ideas work surprisingly well together to tell a larger story about living in a place that sometimes feels forgotten by those in charge, a feeling reinforced even more whenever I return to my hometown of Lismore in the Northern Rivers, a town devastated by floods in 2022 that still hasn’t truly recovered.
These issues aren’t unique to Lismore or Armidale, you’ll find them everywhere, but there’s something particularly distinct about the feeling of nature slowly reclaiming the world around you as parts of regional life fall away. It’s a feeling I hope I’ve managed to capture and convey through this piece of work. This shit’s not for the birds because it sucks, but because sometimes it feels like, in a few more decades, all of this will belong to them.
Biography
Daniel Elliott (Visitors From Dreams) is a multidisciplinary artist living in Armidale, New England, with a strong passion for mixing different mediums, particularly photography, film and animation. Storytelling lies at the core of much of his work, but while most filmmakers focus on narrative, Daniel is more interested in exploring storytelling through environmental atmosphere (often citing Scott Barley, David Lynch, and Albert Falzon as major influences), creating what could be better described as mood pieces or dreams rather than traditional narratives.
Web - www.visitorsfromdreams.com
Instagram - @visitorsfromdreams