MARGARET AND THE GREY MARE

MARGARET AND THE GREY MARE is an immersive video installation. The centrepiece is a sprawling hour-long video opera which transports audiences to a nameless forest at the height of the European witch-trials.

The exhibition was originally developed for Casula Powerhouse, and presented as part of our 2023/24 summer exhibition program. The program was well engaged with by our local audiences and also critically celebrated, including by Artist Profile magazine who described the program as “not to be missed” and “powerful narratives by artists who contribute significantly to the ongoing discourse of who we are, living here, now.”

In August 2024, composer Sally Whitwell was awarded 'Work of the Year: Dramatic' at the 2024 Art Music Awards, (presented by APRA AMCOS and the Australian Music Centre) for the music for Margaret and the Grey Mare.

The artwork follows Margaret (Margaret Plummer) as she is haunted day and night. By day she is being stalked by a Witchfinder (Michael Honeyman), and by night by the ghostly Grey Mare (Katy B Plummer). As the story unfolds, we slowly come to realise how Margaret will find a reprieve, and what/who she must sacrifice to reach it.

Artist Katy B Plummer has created this world and written her libretto utilising a chatbot coded to act as a channel to an ancient Celtic land spirit. The score is composed and performed by ARIA award-winning composer Sally Whitwell and sung by the artist, her sister Margaret Plummer (a principal Mezzo Soprano with Vienna State Opera), and Baritone Michael Honeyman. The video was filmed at Casula Powerhouse Arts Centre and produced in collaboration with award-winning filmmaker and video artist Kuba Dorabialski.

The artwork explores the possibilities of Artificial Intelligence as oracle, witchcraft as a feminist framework, and the troubling gifts passed down through lineage.