Adapted was the culmination of 4 days of masterclasses and sound galleries presented by Australian underground experimental multimedia artists under the aegis of adapt - analogue, digital and physical technologies. As such it was presented as a collaborative sound and video event that functioned both as a showcase of works for the public and as a relaxed wind-down for adapt's participants. I say 'underground' because most of the artists and works presented tended to veer away from mainstream dance electronica and were not affiliated with educational instituations. Without apparent commercial market and institutional constraints artists are generally free to produce highly idiosyncratic works.

This last aspect was certainly evident in the first performance by composer and independent radio identity Andrew Kettle. Kettle explored issues of inter-personal connectivity by creating sound poems based on the live manipulation of recorded speech - phrases drawn from various media sources highlighting the theme of connectivity such as, "Will you come play with us?" and "Are you hooked in?" were cut up and manipulated rhythmically over a droning bed of slowly evolving tones.

Other sound artists such as SEO, lowkey+nude, eyespine and Pip were closer to the beat oriented genre of electronic dance music though often reterritorialising its sonic spaces and transforming the genre's elements into new forms. SEO deftly mixed shortwave radio noise, CD skiping and sequenced elements in a way that exploited the usually devalued sounds of noise and technical breakdown. Lowkey+nude were new Beats as Clare McGrogan performed fragmentary poetry over shifted ambient-techno palettes. Eyespine, lowkey operations and Pip moved closer to familiar dance music territory with the incorporation of industrial elements and some strange deconstructions of techno-funk.

If there was one common stylistic thread I could trace through the performances it was the technique of bricolage: the appropriation of available technologies and stylistic elements, and their subsequent exploitation and transformation into new creative works. All seemed to be bricoleurs of some sort using the technologies' inherent noise, internet-sourced elements/software and the recordings of the other artists for creative purposes. This process may be economic as much as it is stylistic - the artists on the whole are self-funded and this necessitates creating with what is ready-to-hand. Thus the everyday can potentially become a palette of interesting creative elements which are remixed into new forms.

Bricolage was also evident in the visual artists. Mutant Media created a mesmerising video accompaniment to the sound performances often incorporating and manipulating mainstream film and TV footage in layered montages with computer generated patterns. John Aslandis' digital paintings were projected onto a side wall throughout the evening and demonstrated his use of retro-kitsch magazine images floating over vibrantly coloured interference patterns created by the interaction of visual "tones".

Though the works were often quite idiosyncratic, the feeling of the night was of connectivity and collaboration. It seems that artists have built up a rapport which can only have been strengthened by the adapt series of workshops. Certainly there seems to be a lot of support from radio with stations such as 4ZZZ and ABC Radio National both actively involved in the adapt events. There has been further support from the Brisbane-based electronic music label Transmission Communications who haved released a special cassette of participants' sound works. Being hooked into this network means that the electronic multimedia scene in Brisbane may well broaden and flourish. If so, I hope it continues in a vigorously experimental vein.