Artist Statement

The popular suburban Moonee Ponds Market was sold and demolished in the mid-1990s. Laying dormant for 15 years, it has become an under-used, open scar in the centre of the community.

The story of why the site remains dishevelled and uncleared, while ad-hoc corporate developments rise up around it, encapsulates a larger story about urban entropy and citizen disengagement. This forgotten site marks the subtle decay and transformation of our urban environment, as imperceptible to the naked eye as polar ice melt, as consequential to our daily lives as climate change.

Death Watch – a multi-channel video work by Jessie Scott – contemplates this once thriving suburban landmark in the last stages of a protracted terminal decline: no longer the place it was; halted on its way to becoming something else. This fragmented but immersive installation excavates the last, ambiguous details of the former market, piece by piece.