One Object After Another is an artwork, publication and town-wide project developed for Cementa24 in partnership with Kandos Museum. Working with the museum’s collection, its volunteers, local school teachers and residents, Fahd created a multi-part work that included a 240-page artist book, the video and sound work Roll Call, and a series of street posters installed across Kandos.

The project began with the museum’s idiosyncratic collection of industrial objects, local records, school photographs, domestic things and historical fragments. Rather than treating the museum as a fixed record of the past, Fahd approached it as a living site of memory, association and return. Objects were photographed, described, re-ordered and placed in relation to stories gathered through residencies, conversations and time spent in the town.

Across the book, video, sound and public posters, One Object After Another connects the industrial history of Kandos with the intimate material life of its community. The work moves between fact, memory, speculation and description, allowing overlooked details to surface. A school photograph, a museum object, a name read aloud, a poster on a shopfront or a book held in the hand each becomes part of a larger account of place.

Developed over 18 months and four residencies, the project extended beyond the museum into streets, shops, the local radio station and other public sites. In doing so, it treated local history as something carried by objects, voices, images and everyday encounters. The work asks how an artist can activate a regional museum collection and open up new ways of seeing, remembering and speaking about a town.

Cementa24 curated by Daniel Mudie Cunningham

The project was supported by Creative Australia.