June and Peter Kempster took the time yesterday to take me out to Pass River, somewhere I had never been before. The rock formations were stunning, I got to see live kelp up close, and I found a dried leafy sea dragon! The amazing drone photos were taken by Peter.
Algalrhythms
In December 2019, before the
world as we know it changed, I spent 5 weeks wandering the shores of King
Island. Without knowing what was to come, I already felt quite despondent about
the apocalyptic events dominating the world news. It had been a year of Trump,
#metoo, Greta Thunberg, endless gun violence, war, and terrorism, culminating
in the epic fires burning in Australia.
Interestingly, what I found on
the shores of King Island reflected this theme in some ways. My thoughts
regarding death and decay and the fragility of life, found substance in the
wealth of kelp in varying stages of colourful decay on the shores; the
skeletons of birds ripped from the skies, the bones of wallabies, and the
carapaces of sea life littering the island – they all had a beauty – and a
stillness - to them that calmed me. On reflection some time later I realised
that this was the phenomenon biophilia – an hypothesis proposed by
Edward O. Wilson that humans possess an innate tendency to seek connections
with nature and other forms of life. With that connection comes the realisation
that we too, are part of that endless cycle of life, and that every stage of it
is beautiful in some way.
A further hypothesis called urgent
biophilia (Keith Tidball 2012) posits that when disaster strikes via
geophysical events, war, pandemic and the like, humans ‘seek engagement with
nature to further their efforts to summon and demonstrate resilience’, and that
‘within the envelope of our skin is a biological entity which, through
evolution, has been tuned for survival in natural environments’. By engaging
with nature on the island and for the months afterward as I explored it through
textiles, I believe I was feeling biophilia. For those that can’t reach nature,
I hope that my imagery inspired by it may help them in their search for
connection with it, now needed more than ever.
My primary form of record
keeping during the residency was photographs, and some of these are on display with
the related works as very obvious indicators of my inspiration. Others were
more difficult to transcribe, as they weren’t necessarily an object of focus,
but perhaps more a sense – of retained movement, of decay, of disintegration
back into the earth. As the body of work grew, the distance from photograph to
work grew – firstly towards altered digital prints on fabric, then to stylised
lino prints on paper and fabric. This was a pleasing progression, as I wanted
to move away from re-creating, to expressing my own interpretation and
reaction.
My work explores the beauty of
‘tragedy’ using the many textile techniques I have used in the past decade
making wearable art works – most of them biologically inspired. Dyeing is often
a starting point, followed by free-motion embroidery, shibori shaping, needle
and wet felting, leather moulding, and now 3D pen printing and digital
sublimation printing.
Algalrhythms has successfully opened on King Island, the place that inspired each and every work in it. Helen and Karryn did a wonderful job of hanging it, and all suggestions were implemented.
Beautiful noms were provided by Salt & Thyme – they were truly wonderful mouthfuls of delicate and interesting flavour combinations – bravo!
I’ve not had the opportunity to get much feedback on my work over the past few years, so it was lovely to hear it being so well received – watching Janet gasp her way through the rooms made my heart sing! Peter was kind enough to video call Matt so he was able to watch the opening as it happened.
It is really wonderful to see all the works together, and particularly to see the leather sculpture in the foyer – I have never had the space to see it. I’m really happy with the foyer – especially the wonderful piece of wood that I was able to drape my felted work over – just perfect! Even the big pink shipping box has been incorporated into the gallery!
After a few more bubbles I was in bed by 11:30, and back out on the kelp tracks in the morning. It was bitterly cold and windy, but the rougher weather over the last few days meant there had been some nice fresh kelp thrown up.
Sunday was a surreal day as I travelled through 3 airports – it’s been a while! At Hobart I almost missed the connection to King Island as I hadn’t registered the time difference of forward by one hour. Thinking I had an hour to kill, I bought a glass of wine and settled in, only to notice activity at the KI gate. Luckily I decided to check it out, and found that I was the last person they were waiting for! It was exciting to arrive and be greeted by June, my host for my two weeks here. Here is the view as you walk out of her house.
After a trip to the shops for supplies, it was back home to catch up with some drinks, and my favourite for dinner – Wallaby steak! In the morning it was up early for pod coffee – to get me through the getting ready process – then down to the bakery for real coffee, and a reunion with Aunty Fay! June kindly let me borrow her car, so after dropping her at work, I headed back to my beloved British Admiral Beach to see how it was.
Tuesday morning was glorious, so I decided to walk into town for coffee on the way to the gym.
Next it was to the pub for lunch and to catch up with some of the Intertwiners – crocheting ladies of the island whom I had many laughs with last time. There was great interest in the workshop – I took the sample along, and a man in the pub was fascinated by it too!
I felt guilty being inside on such a fine day, so walked down to the harbour and along Big Beach, which last time was festooned with hundreds of bluebottles. I found a few skeletons which are stirring some ideas…
Coming back through the harbour I called in to the Cultural
Centre, where Helen was in her office with the new contact Karryn, so it was
great to meet her, and talk more about the exhibition and workshop plans – they
will both be on hand to help me on Thursday and Friday to install. I am going
to go down to the Cultural Centre tomorrow afternoon when it closes, unpack the
pink box by myself, and work out what’s going where. It’s a little daunting,
but with enough time I should be able to make it work. Well, I have to!
As I write this, the pictured pink box, or ‘coffin’, as we like to refer to it, is somewhere on the road or sea between here and King Island, which lies in the Bass Strait at the bottom of Australia, between the mainland and Tasmania. It had to be repaired after its last trip to New Zealand for WOW, so Matt took the opportunity to renovate it to greater heights to better fit the works so they could stand upright.
In it rest thirty-three works, bound for the walls of the recently re-painted King Island Cultural Centre.
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| Just one of the many light-filled rooms |
I am extremely grateful to Helen Thomas from King Island Council for absolutely taking this idea and running with, not only making it happen, but securing funding from RANTarts to cover the costs – something which as a QLD based artist, I could not. As an adjunct to the exhibition I will be offering both an Artist Talk – watch out, I can talk for several hours about what has gone into making this body of work – and a small workshop on making a Kelp Neck Frill.
It was really hard to
come up with a suitable workshop as I use so many different techniques in my
works – from botanical dyeing, free-motion embroidery, hand embroidery, 3D pen
printing to felting.
The exhibition will show for a month, before being packed up
and sent home for an even larger Opening at Warwick Regional Art Gallery. This
exhibition will include the many variations of my eleven lino prints, and a
series of six stitched digital prints – I think there will be quite the culling
process even though I have the Main Gallery! The exhibition here will run from
6th January – 12th February 2022, and will also feature
an artist talk. I will be publishing details on all events as soon as they are
confirmed.
The last week or so has been a whirlwind of activity as all the machinations of this have occurred – applying for the grant, repairing and packing the box, cataloguing and labelling the works, organising shipping, and conceiving a workshop. Now it is only a matter of weeks until I fly down – not to stay in my beloved Love Shack, but with the fabulous June Kempster!
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| Above - the Love Shack, below, myself and June |
