The Ironing Maidens. Juried Artist
SAE
Vacant Assembly
Artist Statement
‘Mother Controller’ is a projection sculpture using mapped video footage, animated elements and domestic objects. The work foregrounds low and unpaid labour. It references the biased, factory hiring strategies that exploit and enforce the sterotype of “nimble fingers”, and the impact this detailed and repetitive work has on women’s bodies.
This trend that has moved from the fashion industry to the IT and new tech sector is seeing millions of women existing in modern day slavery conditions. Their slavery builds irons, for other slaves to iron.
About the artists
The Ironing Maidens, transform irons and ironing boards into electronic instruments and installation pieces. The work has toured large festivals such as Woodford Folk Festival, international festivals such as Fusion Germany, Berlin Festival of Performance Art and regional laundromats as site specific performance spaces.They won a John Chataway Innovation Award at Adelaide Fringe Festival in 2019 and 2020. In 2023 they won the Pamela Z Innovation award and Best Installation at NIME (New interfaces for Musical Expression) in Mexico City.
Pressing Topics – is an exhibition of projection mapped sculptures, digital photography and video works, irons and ironing boards hacked and repurposed as electronic instruments, sound, lighting and live performance. It addresses themes of labour, technology and gender.
Patty Preece is a musician, electronic music producer, Ableton Live certified trainer and sound artist who works with hacked domestic objects to critically explore aesthetic and relational hierarchies at the intersection of sound, gender and technology. Preece’s practice spans performance, instrument design, production and most recently installation.
This Cairns based artist creates performance ecosystems using discarded domestic steam irons, ironing boards, DIY sensors and electronics. Their live performances engage with augmented domestic objects, noise and the relationship of performer, instrument, and context. Preece’s creative practice research explores themes of labour, instrument design, sonic cyberfeminisms and sound art.
Credits: The Ironing Maidens