Black Box Festival
of Living and Dying Art
by Kyle Bush
LOCATION: BIG BELL, WESTERN AUSTRALIA
Acid
mine drainage (AMD) and acid rock drainage (ARD) are two environmentally
harmful conditions which are common at abandoned mine sites, often acidifying
local fresh water sources, in turn poisoning local marine and terrestrial
ecologies. Natural attenuation of AMD/ARD has been observed on sites where
waste rock heaps are compacted, limiting the flow of water and oxygen. Another
technique - the permeable reactive barrier (PRB) – is a deep trench filled with
material which selectively neutralises acidic elements in ground water as it
flows through naturally.

Often the lifecycle of certain industrial activities persists in different forms beyond those initially intended. Black Box Festival of Living and Dying Art aims to catlayse, reveal and observe the industrial afterlife. The repurposed mine site will become the final resting place of a range of decommissioned and repurposed industrial equipment: aircraft, centre pivot irrigation infrastructure, and construction waste materials. Installed artworks will remain in-situ, exposed to the elements, and will undergo a process of degradation that is accelerated depending on the degree of groundwater contamination present in its immediate surrounds.
Over
many years a spatially linked set of individual Black Box Festival sites
incrementally envelope the abandoned mine. A PRB is installed at each location
during a festival, eventually isolating the source of groundwater
contamination. Each year event stages are positioned atop each waste rock heap
so that gradual and persistent compaction of the surface layer is affected.
Over time the active toxic elements are contained within each heap, effectively
neutralising its damaging effects. Festival infrastructure becomes ecological
observation infrastructure powered by the wind and the sun, measuring
groundwater contamination on site.


Black Box is a cultural vehicle for the celebration of the leftover spaces of urbanisation, a catalyst for the natural attenuation of AMD/ARD impacts, and a testing facility for the new methods of active remediation.
CONTRIBUTORS
Kyle Bush↩