Chris Knowles
b. January 14 1955, Melbourne, Australia.

BIOGRAPHY:   Chris Knowles completed his diploma of fine art at Preston Institute of Technology in 1976 and spent the following years between unsavoury employment and learning how to live in poverty as an artist. During this time he spiralled toward the life of a musician, composer and noise maker, and learned how to create strange films and videos. His first significant gig was courtesy of RMIT Student Union as artist in residence where he ran Super 8 film workshops and founded the RMIT Super 8 film group in the early 1980s.

The following years were highly productive and he somehow survived as an independent media artist; producing, performing, exhibiting and teaching.

In 1989 he burned out, and spent a year travelling to the strangest places he could find. When he returned he began a new career as a composer of sound and music for film and television, and continued to make strange films and videos.

In the mid 1990s in a stroke of great fortune he began working with the Mutitjulu community at Uluru to develop content for their proposed new culture centre at Uluru National Park, and his involvement with the community and the park continues to the present. During this time his career transformed toward the production of larger scale public media works and permanent interpretive displays.

Chris commenced part time work as a researcher and lecturer in media production at the School of Creative Arts, University of Melbourne in 1997.

	Inma Nyangatja Uluruku

CRITICAL OVERVIEW:   My creative practice focuses on themes of belonging, sense of place, cultural identity, diversity and heritage.

My early films tend to deal with landscape, including the urban and cultural environment and our place within it.

The theme of observation without judgment pervades much of my work.

Chris Knowles, March 2006.

FILMOGRAPHY:

	Work in Progress

All works directed by Chris Knowles unless otherwise noted.

Work in Progress (1979, 30 mins, Standard 8mm, Experimental)

Cine Melodie (1979, 25 mins, Standard 8mm)

In the Dark (1982, 30 mins, Super 8mm)

With/Out Movement (1983, 12 mins, Super 8mm)

The Pianist (1983, 39 mins, Umatic Video)

Excerpt (1984, 8 mins, Super 8mm)

Doctor Dark (1984, 40 mins, Super 8mm)

One View (1985, 13 mins, 16mm)
Directed by Chris Knowles and Maggie Fooke

	Doctor Dark

Welcome (1986, 13 mins, Super 8mm)

Auto-Voyeur (1987, 12 mins, 35mm)

Approximate Video (1988, 14 mins, VHS)

A Short Sequence from The White Space Project (1990, 6 mins, VHS)

The Deakin Video (1992, 10 mins, SP-Beta)

Inma Nyangatja Uluruku (This is Inma for Uluru) (1995, 42 mins, SP-Beta)

Pixelated Worlds (1996, 10 mins, SP-Beta)
Directed by Chris Knowles and Ian DeGruchy

100 Acres (2002, 15 mins, miniDV)

	Excerpt

SELECT BIBLIOGRAPHY:

Knowles, C. "Scenario Of An Ignoramus". Cantrills Filmnotes Nos. 35,36, April 1981.

Knowles, C. "Fragments from an abandoned interview...". Cantrills Filmnotes Nos. 39,40, November 1982.

Knowles, C. "Doctor Dark". Cantrills Filmnotes Nos. 45,46, October 1984.

Buckley, M. "Domestic Developments". Filmnews, December 1985.

Fooke, M. "One View". Cantrills Filmnotes Nos. 49,50, April 1986.

Hemensley, K. "Starting From Scratch". (cat) M.I.M.A. Film & Video National Tour Catalogue. 1987

	Approximate Video

Jenkins, J. 22 Contemporary Australian Composers. NMA Publications, Melbourne 1988.

Martini, L. "Chris Knowles". Beat Magazine Issue No. 98, June 1988.

Cantrill, A. & C. "Music/Film/Video/Performance - an interview with Chris Knowles". Cantrills Filmnotes Nos. 61,62, Mar 1990.

Berecry, A. Aurora Australis Film Works. (cat) 1990

Knowles, C. "Working on the Edge of Old and New Technologies". Cantrills Filmnotes Nos. 81,82, June 1996.

Murphy J. "The Lie of the Land". Artlink Vol 17, No 3, 1997.

Contact Chris Knowles

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