1.'Local Bouquet' first appeared for Port Adelaide Artist Forum Fringe Exhibition Feb 2017 at Gallery Yampu.
Actually I preferred the sweeter version 'Promite' but nothing describes my upbringing more than a Vegemite jar. I often made it for my brother's favourite on toast when he was sick, cut into four squares.
2. ’Very Local Bouquet’ 2018
I'm not sure if other Fathers did this but mine was famous for leaving the Sauce bottle upside down (and putting sauce on EVERYTHING - even Mum’s beautiful country killed meat lamb roast!) to get to the very last skerricks of remaining 'dead horse' (sauce in Aussie). I was back in my hometown Port Lincoln helping my Mum live at home with Dementia. She was pretty lost without my Father who had been covering up the extent of her illness. I had become his replacement.
This Bouquet captured the magnificent Banksia pods, my favourite the umbrae coloured Grevillea and iconic pin wheels.
3. ‘’Coastal Bouquet’
I’ve had this print as a concept (drawings and research done) since my Mrs Harris's Shop exhibition with fellow West Coast Artist Cindy the year before. I’d talked about it for another year before that.
The beetroot tin is an icon for Australians representing a bygone era. For me it signifies the beginning of my spiritual journey linked to a childhood story about my search for the divine and praying for the beetroot stain to be remove that Mum liked to tell my friends!
The plants are all natives and mostly only found on the Eyre Peninsula; South Australia. Pigface (Karkalla), Coastal paper daisy (Helichrysum Leucopsideum), Coastal Saltbush (Atriplex Cinerea), Scrubby Gum (Eucalyptus Albopurpurea or Port Lincoln Gum) built to survive the sandy coastal environment of the wild west coast.
The print process has some hiccups including the impact of COVID-19 on the teaching world (we spent the 2020 holidays preparing materials to go online after insane overtime throughout Term 2 & 3 with extra protocols and procedures) so I was elated to celebrate 2 decent prints before I finished hours overtime.
Made especially for my beautiful hometown and their 2021 Bendigo Bank Port Lincoln Art Prize at the Nautilus Arts Centre.
‘4. Grandma’s Bouquet’
Originally this print appeared in 2022 History Festival for West Torrens Council's Little Galleries project. An amazing novel way to provide a gallery experience during COVID Pandemic restrictions. Participants used a map to drive to 9 different locations to see the little galleries. Much gratitude to Di Caught and Jo Harris for including me in the project.
Historic food labels and packaging are a great way to explore history. I found this Fauldings Salts tin in my Grandmother’s First Aid kit of elixirs and home made remedies!
This Bouquet captures local native flora such as the Silver Banksia and Bluebells in this West Torrens themed print.
5.’Sanitised Bouquet’
'Still a Life' was Ginger Lee's Post Pandemic Collective's 2021 Fringe Exhibition at Gingers Cafe in my Neighbourhood. What a time that was! We can have an Opening, we can't have an Opening. Poor Arthur and Jenny trying to run a cafe in a Pandemic. And what happens to your Artistic practice in a world without Art Spaces and gatherings?
This time the Bouquet captures local weeds and common plants you might find in your backyard because that’s where we were in lockdown.
The Ajax Spray n whip the perfect vessel to represent the massive global effort to contain a noxious and deadly virus. Do you remember the cylinder version with the holes in the top that left a chalky resideu if you didn’t wash it off correctly?
6 ‘Mparntwe Bouquet’
It was only fitting that a Bouquet appeared from my 2022 Residency at Central Craft in Mparntwe in the heart of Australia's Northern Territory. The Residency was in a studio on a very sacred women dreaming area with a 300 year old corkwood overlooking. The grounds of the Araluen Gallery and Arts Centre were a botanical reserve and I was fortunate to be gifted an amazing local Educator and Weekend Scientist Vicki Skoss to help me create a bouquet of natives right there on the spot.
She explains 'Desert Rose is a type of native hibiscus. Gossypium bickii. Acacia aneura is the mulga. The short leafed corkwood is the Hakea. And the wide leafed plant which has the two leaves hanging down across the billy is the Kurrajong. ' She also notes 'The native lemon grass'.
The Kurrajong also know as the Compass tree has an amazing story of providing for many in arid desert conditions. The leaves shaped like emu tracks perfectly captures an amazing month of printmaking, hiking the Larapinta trail and learning to say Mparntwe in respect for our Arrernte Peoples of the Red Centre. The billy was found at an old WW2 dump that Vicki's husband Matt took us out to.
'Mparntwe Bouquet' appears here for the first time on exhibition SALA Aug 2023 at Goodwood Theatre & Studio's.
