‘I can’t do it if it’s ugly. I’m completely uninterested in social work that is not simultaneously aesthetic, and simultaneously an interesting conceptual artwork.’
Kirsha is the First Lady of Mona—the boss’s missus, Mona’s better half, or Mrs. Mona if you prefer. The stiletto-toting Yank, and Tassie local since 2010, enhances our core activity with a series of projects that marry an almost vigilante approach to beauty with outrageous glamour, and specific social outcomes. Kirsha is a colourful counterpart to her august mate, who is less interested in beauty than in taking it apart and understanding how it works. She’s drawn to problems rather than avoiding them—and places transformation at the heart of her work, a lifelong quest to turn flaws into features, shit into gold.
An act of radical diplomacy uniting economists, the forestry industry, scientists, conservationists and artists at Mona, to tackle the question: what is the true value of Tasmania’s forests? Like the Congress itself, this question is evolving, and the project ongoing.
‘Aesthetics are a social justice issue’, declares Kirsha. Which is why, perhaps, she founded Material Institute—a non-profit social project and registered charity, reaching from Tassie to the USA, New Orleans to here in Hobart. The Institute seeks to fashion a better, more beautiful world of healthy, resilient communities, in which children can achieve their full potential.
The Ladies Lounge is a tremendously lavish space inside Mona, in which women can indulge in high tea and other ladylike pleasures, surrounded by priceless works of art including several that demonstrate the genius of Picasso, all the while hosted and entertained by the fabulous butlers. No boys allowed.
Read an interview with Kirsha on the Ladies Lounge here.
A kitchen garden program in Tasmanian schools, where kids learn to grow, cook and eat healthy produce with a garden-to-plate ethos.
A conceptual artwork in the form of a school. Programs include:
Hacking School
Students learn to break the internet, bit by bit, in collaboration with Ivy League legends. Think world domination by way of code, makers’ workshops, active hacking and learning, theory, ethics / how to avoid jail, and systems thinking.
The Makeup of the Universe
Students learn about the stars—Miss Universe and the universe—while earning a degree in beauty. Guest lecturers include Nobel Prize–winner Brian P. Schmidt who discovered that the universe is expanding at an accelerating rate. He’s the recipient of our inaugural makeover.
Jung-le Gym
Where conceptual art meets exercise: students act out inner darkness and human archetypes in muscle building aerobic-style, inspired by Carl Jung. Classes take place in open, outdoor spaces, as well as a gymnasium filled with equipment designed by artists and engineers.
The Embassy
Students lay tracks, produce records, write lyrics, and participate in delivery and recording workshops led by esteemed producers.
Bio Lab
Where art meets biological building and research. Students learn the ethics of bioengineering (controversial terrain), create non-toxic nail polishes, designer genes (and jeans), and everything in between—including ways in which we could turn the entire building into a living organism. We’re of the opinion that technology is becoming biology: ‘it’ becomes ‘them’, and then it becomes ‘us’. So, what will it be? Or should that be ‘us’?
A project based in the St. Roch neighborhood of New Orleans in six previously abandoned structures: a former bakery, a storefront, and four 1800s houses. Each housed a site-specific installation for a three month exhibition period, with local and international artists invited to work with the spaces as they found them, as well as with the surrounding physical and cultural environment.
Ridiculous and puerile at best, inciting violence at worst.
—Huon Aquaculture boss Frances Bender
Watch here
A project turning Mona’s ‘fucking useless’ lawns—the erstwhile site of markets and concerts, beanbags and wine—into a bountiful vegetable garden during COVID-19, complete with social media competition encouraging the general public to follow along at home while cultivating their own victory garden. View the weekly video series here.
Heavy Metal brings together art and science to address the pollution problem from multiple, creative angles. Press
An al fresco extravaganza of music and food, art and performance, science and craft (of the non-naff variety). A glamorous, roaming collision of high and low art, held on Sundays in the summertime. MoMa—only slightly shitter than Salamanca market. Much, much shitter than the MoMA in New York.
In a recent ruling by the Tasmanian Civil and Administrative Tribunal, artist and curator Kirsha Kaechele was ordered to allow men entry to the Ladies Lounge, her artwork at Mona. On a recent flight to Milan, Kaechele sat down to discuss the court’s decision and the future of the artwork.
17 August 2023
A few years ago, I was invited to do the keynote for the Tasmanian Economic Forum. You’ve got the wrong person, I told them. Of all subjects on earth, economics is the one I know least about. And definitely care least about. One need only begin to say the word, econo … zzzzzzz … and I’m snoozing off. But they insisted: they wanted someone from outside their world, someone fresh, to shake things up. Fine. But I should at least offer something relevant to their forum. So I did some calculations and presented this graph:
Gabriella Coslovich • Sydney Morning Herald
Hobart’s popular Museum of Old and New Art (Mona) could be forced to shut down its women-only Ladies Lounge created by Kirsha Kaechele, wife of museum founder David Walsh, if an anti-discrimination case launched by a male visitor is successful...
Nick O'Malley • Sydney Morning Herald
Everyone is curious about Mona founder David Walsh and his American wife Kirsha Kaechele, an artist and curator. As word got out that she was planning conference about the logging industry, people were immediately intrigued...
I don’t actually give a fuck about diamonds,
I prefer my husband pay for my social projects.
🖤