In his interactive installation at Perth Institute of Contemporary Art (PICA), Bruno Booth has created a short, playful and surprisingly difficult obstacle course to give participants a real-life experience of getting around on two-wheels.
The work, Dead Ends and Detours, puts participants in a wheelchair on a course that is in the shape the international symbol used for accessible spaces — the wheelchair graphic.
"The idea is that people come along, they get in a wheelchair, and they try and navigate this course that I've made," Booth says.
"It's also a bit of a race against the clock as well — if you're really good, you might get on the leaderboard."
Booth can navigate the raised, twisted ridges with ease, but he's still unsure how people without experience using a wheelchair will go.
"There's a little bit of an unknown here, is it going to function?" he says.
"Or is it going to frustrate people, which I'm not too bothered with."
The installation, which was jointly commissioned by PICA and Melbourne-based arts incubator Next Wave, is primarily about "getting people to empathise with the disabled community," Booth says.
"Rather than seeing disability as a negative and a problem that people should overcome, I see it as a skill set that is valuable, it's just a different skill set.
"I think people will realise that as soon as they get in the chair, and they attempt this course, actually how difficult it is.
"But then if they see a wheelchair user like myself do it ... I'm not tooting my own horn, but I can blast through it pretty quickly."
One of the things people will have to learn is not just the strength required, but the skill, like lifting their legs and leaning forward to do a "wheelie" to get over the bumps in the course.
"You get strong [using a wheelchair] because it's a physical activity," he says.
"I used to work out a lot more, and I don't anymore, but I'm still fit, and I'm still strong, even without doing that, so I know I burn a lot of calories every day pushing myself around."
Apart from a brief period of trying prosthetics as a child, which he did not like, Booth has always used a wheelchair and says it was "a great decision for me personally".
He says he is not as bothered as he used to be by terms such as "wheelchair-bound" but he does hope his work makes people rethink their ideas.
"It used to annoy me a lot more if someone would say wheelchair-bound, because I'm not strapped in, I'm not bound to this, I can get out if I want to," he says.
"But I think now I'm a lot more pragmatic about those things.
"People aren't doing it to be malicious, they're just using language that they've been taught."
He hopes it will prompt more thought about how public spaces are designed and take people with disabilities into account.
"Things are a lot better than they were when I was growing up 20 years ago, but I still think there are some sort of planning decisions that get made without proper consultation of the disabled community, or they only consult a few people.
"And sometimes those decisions just seem a bit strange — why did you do it like that when you could have done it like this?"
Booth doesn't want his work to be a lecture. He instead hopes participants have fun along with a bit of frustration and he has built in some jokes that will only become clear when people complete the course.
"I think if you're up for a challenge, then that's where you'll get the most out of it.
"I kind of like my work to have those elements of humour in there. I don't want to be all doom and gloom, I want it to be an enjoyable experience."
Dead Ends and Detours is open for visitors from 10am – 5pm on March 18 and 19 in the Perth Cultural Centre amphitheatre. The installation is free and does not require bookings.
