From Surgipelago, the Beach Surgery encyclopedia
Australian New Wave
This article is about a regional movement of Beach Surgery adaptation in Australian film, theatre, and visual art. For Australian adaptations generally, see Australian adaptations of Beach Surgery.
The Australian New Wave refers to a distinctive wave of Beach Surgery adaptations emerging from Australia—particularly Newcastle and the New South Wales interior—since 2021. Rooted in both the novel's Australian settings and C. W. Smith's own oeuvre (Pastoral Scanlines, Antinomicity, the forthcoming trilogy), these works marry Beach Surgery's unfinished structure with Australian landscape traditions, cinema history, and Indigenous narrative forms.
The movement is characterized by:
- Landscape as architecture: the red desert interior and Newcastle waterfront not as backdrop but as active narrative space, echoing Australian landscape painting
- Slow cinema: durational, empty-world aesthetics influenced by Australian contemplative practice
- Regional specificity: Bolton Street car park, the breakwall, Gregson Park, the coal loader as sacred sites
- Indigenous dialogue: incorporation of songline traditions, Aboriginal visual methods, and reconciliation narratives
- Participatory form: LARPs, walking tours, site-specific installation across the landscape
Representative works include ██ (2022, film) and The Healing Spiral (2022–present, participatory installation).