Clemenger Tasmania / OMD launches The Hothouse at Dark Mofo from June 1-3 in Tasmania

Clemenger Tasmania/OMD has announced its involvement in this year’s Dark Mofo – the Museum of Old and New Art’s prestigious winter festival in Tasmania, in a groundbreaking venture.

Clemenger Tasmania/OMD, in conjunction with Dark Mofo and key partners the University of Tasmania, Hobart City Council and News Corp have developed an exciting new project called The Hothouse.

Held from June 1 – 3, The Hothouse will facilitate a 72-hour process where selected participants will demonstrate the power of creative thinking to generate ideas in response to an issue. The ideas generated by The Hothouse aim to initiate real and meaningful change; change that can affect the way people see, behave, and think about an issue which affects the entire state of Tasmania. That issue is yet to be announced.

Clemenger Tasmania/OMD Tasmania will be facilitating the process, with local and national ‘thinkers’ recruited to be part of the process. It’s also intended to give the wider community an opportunity to feed in their ideas during the 72 hours. The aim is to have tangible, actionable ideas that other entities might want to take on themselves after the event has finished. These ideas will be presented to the public at the Hothouse Forum at Hobart’s historic Odeon Theatre during Dark Mofo on June 11.   

Says Matt Fishburn (left), managing director of Clemenger Tasmania / OMD Tasmania: “This is not a talk fest – we’ll have informed briefs to work to, and participants will have a team of roving specialists from across the Group to help with the development of ideas. It’s all part of our desire to incite real and meaningful change in Tasmania.”

Says Marcus Murphy (above, right), creative director of Clemenger Tasmania: “It’s a depiction of the power of creative ideas across both Creative and Media disciplines, fuelled by a collaborative approach that we need to see more of in this State. Dark Mofo believes in the power of creativity and curates one of the most exciting festival platforms in Australia, the City of Hobart is actively investing and participating in creative outcomes, and the University of Tasmania is giving their students a unique opportunity to work on a real world project.”

The Hothouse structure has been designed in collaboration between Sydney’s Cave Urban Design Collective and Master of Architecture Students from the School of Design, University of Tasmania.

Says Leigh Carmichael, creative director, Dark Mofo: “Dark Mofo is presenting The Hothouse with our project partners as a way to highlight how creative thinking can provide ‘outside the box’ solutions to difficult and complex topics. The Hothouse presents a visible space for this kind of activity, with a focus on community engagement and tangible outcomes.”