Digging through and crossing over

As a young boy in England, artist Eric Snell spent beach-side summers trying to dig his way to Australia. Why? He wanted to see through to the other side of the world, of course. Now, at the conclusion of a three-month Arts Council of England-funded residency at Brisbane’s Institute of Modern Art (IMA), Snell has experienced, first-hand, the land of his childhood dreams. But, more than that, he is in the process of completing the ‘big dig’: sneak peaks of Australia and England will soon be available to viewers in each country who are willing to peer into Snell’s hole – the View to the Other Side of the World.