At PICA we recognise that we are situated within the unceded lands of the Whadjuk people of the Noongar Nation. We pay our respects and offer our gratitude to Elders past and present. We acknowledge all Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people and the importance of their care and continued connection to culture, community and Country.

Always was, always will be.

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Friends with Computers

Under Waters: Opening Night & Artist Talk

Under Waters: Opening Night & Artist Talk

Join Friends with Computers for the opening of Under Waters, the inaugural boorda yeyi Immersive Arts Commission at PICA, followed by an artist talk by Wiradjuri–Scottish artist, April Phillips, Technical Director Jordan East and Virtual Art Director Pat Younis.

Under Waters is a deeply sensory, interactive installation that draws audiences into a speculative deep past where First Nations knowledge, science and poetic computation converge. The artist talk offers a chance to hear directly from the creatives about their collective practice, Friends with Computers, and the process of devising and presenting immersive artworks grounded in cultural reciprocity, and working with Country and deep time.

Register below

About the artists

April Phillips is a Wiradjuri–Scottish woman of the Galari/Kalari peoples, living and working on Yuin Country, South Coast NSW. Her practice is grounded in futurism and media arts, spanning moving image, printmaking, illustration, 3D assets, AR research and photogrammetry. Drawing equally on analogue processes and emergent technologies, Phillips explores kinship, place and techno-poetics, often leading collaborative teams to realise ambitious, interdisciplinary projects.

Phillips graduated with a degree in Creative Arts and Design from Charles Sturt University in 2018; undertook field research in Malta; and completed advanced training in augmented reality at the School for Poetic Computation in New York in 2021. 

She has presented significant solo exhibitions including Drop Let,  Australian Design Centre, Sydney; Blak Dot, Melbourne; and Next Wave, Melbourne (2025); LOOK ▷ SEE, Melbourne International Film Festival (2024); kajoo yannaga (Come on, Let’s Walk Together), ACMI / Now or Never, Melbourne (2024); and Body Place, Bankstown Arts Centre/Utp, Sydney (2024). Major commissions include Body Place, Bankstown Arts Centre, Sydney (2024); Blooms + Bugs, Canberra University Hospital (2024); and Jacky Winter Waters, Walkerville North, Victoria (2021). She has also exhibited internationally at World Expo Osaka (2025), SXSW Sydney (2025), MODE Festival, Cockatoo Island, Sydney (2025) and Neurotitan Gallery, Berlin (2019).

Recognised for her leadership in digital arts, Phillips was named Rising Star of the Year by Women in Digital (2023) and received the Melbourne International Film Festival Uncle Jack Charles Award (2024) for her work kajoo yannaga, developed in collaboration with Now or Never Festival, ACMI and RMIT. Her commitment to cross-disciplinary innovation has been supported through major residencies and fellowships, including the Australian Council for the Arts Digital Fellowship (2022), Megalo Print Studio, Canberra (2022) and Arteles, Finland (2014). Further recognition has come through national prizes, as finalist for the Fremantle Print Prize (2025) and Gosford Moving Image Award (2025). 

Most recently she was awarded both Creative Australia’s 2025 Emerging and Experimental Arts Fellowship, affirming her position as one of Australia’s most rapidly evolving contemporary media artists. As a founding member of the Friends with Computers collective, Phillips playfully engages digital technologies as tools for art making, with a focus on futurism, human intelligence and ethical methodologies.

Pat Younis is a real-time artist and Virtual Art Director whose practice moves fluidly across film, contemporary art and music. Since 2018, he has specialised in interactive technologies such as Unreal Engine, working within Virtual Art Departments for major film productions while collaborating with artists on immersive installations and musicians on live visual environments. His work translates creative ideas into tangible virtual realities, positioning real-time space as a site for both technical problem-solving and aesthetic innovation. A longstanding passion for video game technologies informs his hybrid practice, which reimagines the tools as platforms for storytelling, experimentation and cross-disciplinary collaboration. Through this approach, Younis contributes to a growing global community of artists and technologists shaping the future of digital culture.

Jordan East is a media artist working in Sydney, on the lands of the Gadigal and Wangal peoples. His practice explores the relationship between technology and music through immersive video and augmented physical environments. Spanning video, projection, interactive installation and theatre, his projects often evolve in collaboration with improvisational musicians. At the intersection of experimental electronic music and moving image, his projects interface performers and audiences with technology through sensors and responsive systems. His process employs procedural animation, photogrammetry, real-time generative methods and emerging digital workflows to blur the boundaries between physical and virtual worlds.

Supporters

Commissioned as part of boorda yeyi and Boorloo Contemporary | Perth Festival, supported by Wesfarmers Arts . 

PICA’s boorda yeyi program is made possible with thanks to Founding Patron, The Ian Potter Foundation, Principal Patrons the Feilman Foundation and Lotterywest, and Touring Partner ART ON THE MOVE.