Date: 2006-12-07. Tags: interview

Curly has been kicking around for a long time now, injecting her unique brand of happiness and enthusiasm into Australian cities. She's a compulsive traveler, photographer and joy spreader. Below the smiles and frizz lie a complex character with a steely courage for finding the biggest tunnels and soloing the tallest structures. I caught up with her recently to shoot the shit...

ds: Okay gimme the basics: Name, age, vital stats all that stuff.
cu: Curly, 22. I am an explorerer type person

ds: Explorerer type person, you do a lot of other stuff as well though.
cu: Well, I make music, I take photos, I climb things, crawl through things, fly around australia doing said stuff. Sydney never bores me, it just inspires me to go elsewhere.

ds: Oooh very politically correct answer. What's your fav aus city?
cu: For the drains: Melbourne. For the fun times: Adelaide. For the most comfortable / unique / interesting drain: Hobart. For the wackidy crazed peeps: Brisbane. Every cities got its own thing. BUT for massive awesome shit, SYDNEY!

ds: You got a positive outloook. You're in the Cave Clan but seem to operate outside it a fair bit. What's the deal?
cu: hmmmm the way I see myself now, I'm Curly who explores Curly related infrastructure, who was introduced to exploring by the Cave Clan *but* the cave clan is where it all began and I still consider myself a member.

ds: So you're stepping it up a notch, taking the clan learnings to another level?
cu: It's a natural progression. Well, the cave clan is a basis for social type interaction but when I started exploring in the curly world there wasn't the possibility to make it a social gig. As in, I went it alone mostly.

ds: Seems to be working okay, you've found some mindblowing locations of late. Some I've been lucky enough to see myself.
cu: Yeh, we rocked dat shit. Well it started with major construction in capital cities in Australia where there has been a large amount of expenditure. I wanted to climb higher and dig deeper into these places. Firstly, there was a major accident in sydney on one said construction project and that provided the possibility of dropping down large shafts into mindbendingly large tunnels.

ds: I remember that accident, it was pretty big news.
cu: You've just gotta sniff out the diesel fumes. The first was a set of 7m diameter tunnels running approx 12km in sydney. I uploaded a couple shots to the net and you can expect people responded. It was something I never imagined to be so simple with the right ettiquette. To this day I've explored the entirety of these projects without being seen/caught once.

ds: It's all the time you spent in brisbane at ninja school :)
cu: haha u got dat right, ninjaaaaa. I think you brisvegas peeps and a select couple adelaide peeps inspired me to get out of the drains.


ds: Yeah you're pretty well rounded for an explorer, if you're not digging then I'm seeing crazy cityscape shots. You've got no fear of heights I take it?
cu: Not at all, since a young age I lived off the adrenaline. Personally I find it's about keeping your head balanced and being confident in your movement. Once you make an unintentional move its all over and at 200m+ above the city You REALLY dun wanna lose your head.

ds: So true, does this tie back into the solo thing again. It's far riskier, why take that chance?
cu: Coz then you can actually depend on yourself and nothing else. I find comfort in that. I get a lot of people wanting info/guided tours, but that isn't how I identify with the riskier stuff. Part of the game is eyeing it out yourself, getting yourself going and reaching the top. You dont have a clue how it works until you push your limits.

ds: Mmm learn by doing. Your photography is dope, has that attitude of DIY influcened it? Seems like you're pushing the experimental styles a lot
cu: hah, ive got very little technical knowlege at all. I've just had a camera surgically attched to me for almost 10 years now. It's by far the easiest way to gain skills - just let them develop themselves.

ds: You've got a few key things that mark your underground style, gels and colours especially
cu: Yeah, I'm an absolute colour junkie. I used gels I bought from a reverse garbage place in brisbane back in '04. They kept ripping up in tunnels and I'd end up using whatever works. I've even used clothes to filter my light.

ds: Underground is ghetto like that though, it's the low key black sheep of the photo family.
cu: Ghetto baby, we so cool!


ds: Any thoughts on the digi V film debate? Do you even care?
cu: I've got very little understanding of it, as far as I know cameras take photos. My camera takes photos, and that works well for me.

ds: The curlyworks site has been bubbling away for a while now, any plans for it? Take over the world?
cu: hehehe ooh you'd better believe it, its gonna DOMINATE. I dunno, I almost deleted it the other day... I have a very destructive nature over the internet but hey, its handy to have something to play with as you once said. Curlyworks/curlybean will ride on somewhere forever I hope

ds: Do you write much, any thoughts on adding text to complement the pics?
cu: I've never been confident with words, but if I get emotional after an awesome sploring experience theres no stopping the text flowing. On my site I like the simplicity of a short description to the image. All my life I've been a very visual person. I think the main problem is that feeling your just repeating yourself over and over

ds: In the literal descriptions of the explorations, or the feelings that they arouse?
cu: It's a very literal statement. English seems to have its boundaries... if you have the passion tho there are no boundaries! I'm always getting stuck not only through text but also in real life, finding specific words.. people probably wanna strangle me with my vague shit hahah

ds: Nah you seem to laid back, who's going to strangle you eh?
cu: I'm a very level headed person most of the time I have very little aggression, wanna test me? :P

ds: I know you're SO AAAAAANNNNNNNNGRRRRRYYYYYYYYYY hahah
cu: I take the anger out climbing 60 stories worth of ladders haha grrrrrrrrr FOR FUCKS SAKE DS

ds: Sorry, didn't mean to fire you up. Still, the world could learn a lot from that attitude. What's on the boiler for the next few years? Picked up that overseas travel itch from Siologen, Durgin, Guru or any of the Aussie explorers lately?
cu: I certinately have. You are continually bombarded with amazingly rad explorables through fellow exploring people. For now, I'm grounding myself and saving myself a bitta money after doin a good 70,000km round australia. I can feel the force sucking me towards japan, switzerland (for the cows and the chocolate and the alps) and CANADAAAA. Europe - I haven't felt it yet.. too much turd haha

ds: You'd love japan. Hey you're an anime head, if you could live in any anime which would it be?
cu: Definitely furi kuri, I'd love to climb on top of the giant iron thing with the vespa lady. Its dope, that anime will never escape my mind. fu fu fuuuuuuuuuri KU KU KURRRRI!


ds: Lots of peeps know about your photos and exploring but a big passion of yours is the creation of music and its fusion with urbexy samples. Any plans for an official album, or a music video?
cu: I've been editing all of my electronic music for the last 2 months. Mixing in recorded samples from all around australia in tunnels, reservoirs, abandoned structures. Theres always been the intention to make a cd but for the moment the idea is to upload the music to curlybean for keen folk to download themselves. The music is generally designed for specific underground localities from round australia so it mixes well with recorded samples.

ds: I remember going on expos with your lil speaker pumping tunes, it adds a mad vibe. 100% curly.
cu: Haha, it became another chronicle in the world of curly. I remember the kiddos in adelaide went and did a drain without me, came back complaining it wasnt as good without music

ds: I can imagine you a hippy just chilling in the drains and telling stories to a circle of young drainer tikes.
cu: haha raised by hippies, socialised with hippies as a teen, and it all rubs off on adult life. There's definitely some ultra girly girl in me.

ds: You wanna go into detail. You're an honourary clan girl member right?
cu: It's hard to begin and end with an ending when you go into detail. well, its gone past that - I've been accepted as a clangirl. and thats all I ever wanted! It's tough and complicated but basically put im a girl with a genetic facade and I've learnt to thrive socially and experience what most society wouldnt experience since I was tiny. It wasn't until I found exploring and the people I met through the cave clan that I was able to express myself

ds: the clan draws a pretty weird bunch of misfits and micreants. No one in the clan is 'normal', it's a big family or oddness.
cu: Thats what you can always rely on! I mean it consists primarily of males; it's hard for females, let alone transsexuals!


ds: Sure but someones gotta forge the hard path, not that I pretend at all to understand how hard that may be sometimes. surely you can't explain it in a simple sentence.
cu: Yeah, it takes a lifetime of explaining for those who don't experience it themselves to understand. I could always give you the typical "transsexuals are people who are blah blah blah" but thats just annoying. I'm just lucky to have close friends in Australia who will be able to accept that I may be a mixture of two things at once, and just come exploring with me.

ds: But those two things aren't consequential at all to those you explore with.
cu: We'll go out to abandoned places, wear sexy clothes, and take fuckin awesome photos and feel great about ourselves. hahah. its a beautiful contradiction and gives you an invincible feeling."It'd be so fuckin funny is security turned up now" (while wearing nurse outfits and knee highs in an abandoned brickworks).

ds: Haha, I'd love to see that
cu: Theres only a select group of girls who do this sorta stuff tho, I could name all of them counting with one hand. one two three...four?
ds: keep it on the low down, secrets are a good thing

ds: Any last comments, requests, shouts, blahblahs - all the usual junk
cu: Heres to my partner in MASSIVE FUCK OFF TUNNELS: Rogue. My most important girls of the nation: Drac, Dirge, Sputnik, Amber, Elfen and so forth. The kick arse photo people who keep the shit real: Yourself, Pizzy, Siolo. Thankyou finally to the cave clan for the initial inspiration and the mostly awesome social scene

ds: For real, come visit me in Europe next year. We'll go stomp the catacombs.
cu: anythings possible baby. ch ch chiikrow fuck ya'll, im out!

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