Felicity Griffin Clark

detail Desert Tryptich

Felicity Griffin Clark is a textile artist based in Melbourne, Australia. Felicity uses silk, wool, alpaca and linen, mulberry bark, synthetics, paper, metals and found objects to convey colours, textures and meanings in unconventional ways. She has exhibited her work in Australia and overseas and won the inaugural Buda Textile Award in 2008.

Felicity was featured in the July 2013 edition of Down Under Textiles and has work featured in New York artist Seth Apter’s latest book “The Mixed-Media Artist: Art Tips, Tricks, Secrets and Dreams From Over 40 Amazing Artists”.

Felicity worked for more than 20 years as a social policy analyst and researcher, specialising in Aboriginal policy.  She is a currently graduate student at the University of Melbourne:  her research interests include mediaeval and early modern funerary rituals and textiles for babies and children, and maps as cultural artefacts.

DESERT TRIPTYCH

  A burnt quilt made of eucalyptus dyed blanket, 

  cotton, satin, synthetics

89 cm w  x 127 cm h

 2010

I have been haunted by the landscape of central Australia since my first visit there in 2007. There is a compelling mystique about the country around Alice Springs and into the desert - I feel drawn, mesmerised by the rocks and red dust - I want to sink into it and lose myself in its red antiquity.

I long to take off into the desert and feel annihilated by the space, clear air and luminosity. I begin to understand the desert fathers. I think you could spend your life wandering, yearning, searching for the spirit of this place.

Although I am a whitefella, I can feel that there is another way of reading this landscape but it is out of my reach. Whitefella maps and language and way of understanding the world are pitifully insufficient to grasp the spirituality of this landscape that quivers massively, just out of our reach.

Like an unlettered animal we can intuit a skeleton of meaning and realise that there is a body of symbolism and that the earth is alive in a completely different way, but it is not ours. And I think this leaves the whitefella with a profound grief - so profound that he cannot grasp this either and is left bemused and pained by something he can't understand.

The red earth, the convulsed rocks reach out, yearning for connection. The whitefella can dimly feel and reflect the yearning but cannot work out how to connect, how to be with the earth and is condemned to bereftness.

The desire for connection with the landscape has followed me back to the city. I am haunted by its low vibration – not a sound but something like a frequency just out of range. I'm sure that this is because it is not my country. And yet it affects me like a deep continuous yearning – I want to go back and just sit and listen

detail Desert Tryptich

 

XYLEM PHLOEM: THE INTERIOR LANDSCAPE OF TREES

Wool, synthetics, silk, cotton, tulle, oilsticks, ink, layered, stitched & burnt

30 cm w x 140 cm h

 2014

 Xylem Phloem: the interior landscape of trees reflects inner structures and colours of trees as seen through microscope. Greens, blues, reds, bronzes: an intricate balanced system of tubes, pores and valves transport sugars, water and oxygen - the tree's life blooda living landscape.

  Techniques and materials

  Wool, hand-dyed cotton, silk and synthetic fabrics; silk and rayon               thread; sequins, plastic. Oil paintsticks. Chopped up synthetic fabrics, sequins and bits of plastic placemat were layered over a base of wool and then cotton wholecloth, covered in tulle and stitched, then burnt back with a heat gun. Colours and lines  were enhanced with oil paintsticks. 

JEALOUSY

Damaged hand-dyed wholecloth, layered with synthetics, silks, cotton & tulle - stiched slashed and burnt

120 cm h  x 95 cm w

2010

       

Inspired by betrayal and deceit – this piece was painful and cathartic to make.  

The sour greens and yellows of jealousy are slashed by bitter puce and the crimson passion of uncontrolled emotion.  Lines from William Blake’s poem A Poison Tree are written/hidden throughout the work. 

Linda Bear

detail Best of Friends

The foundations for where I stand today go back further than High school sewing classes and a tertiary education aimed squarely at the Textiles industry. The skill to stitch, coupled with a love for the versatility of fabrics has been handed from mother to daughter for 4 generations.

I suppose that I’ve come into the quilting industry later than most, having gone along to my first patchworking class when our son started Kindergarten just over 12 years ago. I reveled in an environment where women stitched together, shared their triumphs, joys and woes. Patchwork
opened up a whole new world of freedom where colours and prints didn’t have to go together to “go together”. The concept that “old and ugly” could add something special to a quilt and that the adage of “less is more” was a rule to be acknowledged and bent a little was liberating.
I learnt that a handmade quilt has the power to tell a story about the maker or events; it can hold precious memories and stir emotions. Each one made is unique and has a personality of its very own.

These days my Patchworking is centred around commission work specializing in memory quilts and teaching. My classes have a strong emphasis on traditional methods and the history behind them. My aim is to infuse a love for “Tactile Textiles” and educate others so that these valuable skills will be passed on for generations to come.

BEST OF FRIENDS

Cotton, poly/wool.  Blocks: reverse applique by hand, machine pieced.
Beautifully machine quilted by Karen Terrens

200 cm square

2012

         This is one of a very few quilts where I have purchased fabric with a specific purpose in mind. I had been caught up in researching Signature and Album Quilts of the Mennonite communities in America and my German ancestry. The idea of paper cut patterns and Fraktur appealed to my creative side and I had collated a stack of doodlings on the backs of bills, envelopes and the like. Never one to back away from a challenge, I put to and devised a method for putting my sketches together.

Each block was to have a space for an individual’s signature in the centre as in the 1800s; members of a community would come together and each would contribute a single block for a quilt. 
The top would be pieced and quilted by all participants and then gifted. It may have been to celebrate coming of age, a marriage or relocating to another county. 
The design for the large, central block has elements from each of the smaller blocks. Two stems entwine to represent how a community is bound together although being separate parts of the whole.

detail Best of Friends

Thistle Dew Daisy

Top: wool and wool blend fabric; wool and alpaca yarn. Wool top is machine pieced from repurposed family garments dating from 1940’s to 1985

The tufted daisies and embroidered stems used to be jumpers from my childhood, stitched over templates that are then removed.
Quilting : Tied with wool yarn through all three layers

Size : w 112cm x h 130 cm

Year : 2009

Price/NFS : NFS

Some of my earliest memories are of a toddler playing in her mother’s scraps box in the linen press. Small bundles of off cuts from garments made, repaired and altered were always saved ready for the next job. When the scraps were too small to make and repair clothing the pieces were stitched together to make blankets or cut into confetti to become stuffing for cushions and toys.
All that remains of a pale blue pinafore from the 1940s, black and white flecked trousers from the 50s and the mid blue striped skirt form the 70s are included in this quilt top. The yarn from Jumpers that we grew out of were always unraveled and re knitted so nothing went to waste. The short, endy bits of yarn were used for poms poms and decorative stitching. 

detail Thistle Dew Daisy

Significant Ties

Materials :
Top: Ties - silk and some synthetic. Silk Dupion
Backing : 100% cotton, Manufacturer’s labels from Ties used for the top
Batting :60% poly/ 40% wool

Techniques :
This quilt is machine pieced and consists of elongated blocks made from silk ties, giving it a beautiful weight and luxurious feel. It is tied with silk ribbon in the centre of each block

Size : W 185 cm x H 195 cm

Year : 2010

From time to time I'm presented with fabric in one form or another which is just too precious to throw away. Usually there is a sentimental attachment that gives us joy; memories of happy times. It might be scraps from the sewing box, garments and ties no longer worn or fabric that speaks to your inner sense for the need to create. 

A while after my Dad died Mum presented me with all of his ties with the hope that perhaps the boys might be able to wear some of them. Open neck shirts are now the order of the day for a Sales Rep and the only tie the Lad will wear is a school tie so this wish wasn't going to be fulfilled any time soon. What was I to do with a life time of ties? I couldn't part with them, silks or polyester. A tie from Dad's first day as Paymaster of Campbell Soups Australia, the tie he wore on his wedding day and the tie he wore to ours; so many precious memories hidden away in the cupboard. I decided to re-purpose them (and a few others added in) and make them into a quilt for the lad; one that he could take through all stages of his life. He's always been a tactile sort of chap and would enjoy the touch of silk. So, after sorting the good from the bad, adding to the collection from other significant males in our circle and choosing a style, I set to work. 

detail Significant Ties

There is a great deal of fabric in a tie when you deconstruct it. They're generally cut on the bias and are at least twice as wide as what can be seen. After stripping close to 100 ties templates were cut and pieces interfaced with Weaveline to give the silk body but not stiffness and to reduce fraying. Corners were added in contrasting colours of silk dupion to complete the blocks and then the sewing began in earnest.

To get the correct size for the backing I needed to add a strip through the middle so I used up the left over tie blocks(I always cut extras for "just in case" moments) and stitched labels from the ties across the back.
Once the top, batting and backing were sandwiched, I tied the quilt through the block centres with silk ribbon. So there are approximately 90 ties chopped up here from Pa, Dad, 4 Uncles, Mr Santamaria (awesome school teacher), Mr Agnew (awesome school Principal) Rodney Shire Council, and the Royal Australian Flying Doctor Service. The finished product is queen size, and consists of 1300 pieces. The binding is made up of left over pieces from other quilts that I've made and fitted the bill 

detail from back of Significant Ties

Susan Mathews

detail Nightshift

In 2011 while I was still living in Yarrawonga in NE Victoria, I was engaged as one of two textile artists to take part in the Wangaratta Textile Project, an Arts Victoria undertaking. The other artist was Andrea Komninos from Melbourne. We made site visits to the Bruck factory and Australian Country Spinners in Wangaratta and were given access to research that had been done re these industries and also to the textile collection of the Wangaratta Art Gallery, which is doing a great job of building on the textile history of their rural city. Our brief was that we could choose any aspect of textiles as they relate to Wangaratta that inspired us and that we were to make one piece of work, the progress of which we were to blog about on the Culture Victoria website. It was exciting seeing Andrea's work unfold and interesting to see her take on it all next to mine.( www.cv.vic.gov.au)

              I found the factory visits fascinating, the massive machinery with its constant motion and everything on such a grand scale. What also drew me in was learning about the vital role that the textile industry played in the development of Wangaratta with the associated influx of migrant workers and the consequent construction of housing and electricity infrastructure. Stories of life at the factories, which in bygone days operated 24 hours a day and which had actually housed workers and families on site, were intriguing. The factories were a place of work but also a social hub with various sporting clubs and activities and of course, the annual picnic complete with games and races. This was the soul of the industry and I found it fascinating.

              My own research revealed a number of friends who had family or other connections to the factories and also turned up a couple of very interesting connections to members of my own family, which, given the fact that I grew up in Melbourne, I found compelling. I was intrigued by a man called Stan Arms who had managed Bruck for about 20 years. While he was in charge, a house for visiting dignitaries and a few cottages designed by Robin Boyd were built, another gem I had not previously known of in Wangaratta.. Another discovery about Wangaratta was that it has a seriously good piano which is one of only two in the world and which is kept in its own climate controlled room. Apparently, Stan who was also a founding member of the Wangaratta Arts Council, was sent to Hamburg to order the piano. The other one is said to be suffering from altitude sickness in South America somewhere!.

              Australian Country Spinners started life as the Wangaratta Woollen Mills in the 1920s and to get it off the ground the public was invited to subscribe. To publicise this the daughters of the founder went flying in a bi-plane throwing out publicity leaflets over the area.

              All these things and more really resonated with me and when I had finished my piece for the Wangaratta Textile Project, I felt compelled to keep making more work around this topic. I completed a further five pieces of work and these were exhibited along with my piece for the Wamgaratta Textile Project as an exhibition titled "Fabrications" in the foyer of the Wangaratta Performing Art Centre, a space curated by the Wangaratta Art Gallery, from December 2011 until February 2012. Two of these pieces are now in the Wangaratta Art Gallery's textile collection and two more you see here.

NIGHT SHIFT

Procion dyeing; linocut printing; machine pieced; fused applique; free motion stitching using a domestic sewing machine.  Cotton fabric; procion dyes; water soluble block printing ink; polyester threads; wool.polyester batting

99 cm h x 145 cm w

2011

I was overawed by the massed wires of the jacquard looms in the Bruck factory which soared high into the air and had a grandness about them. I have tried to illustrate this in the largest section of this quilt with very close stitching which gives the sheer effect which was evident in the real thing. This theme is repeated on a smaller scale in a linocut print repeated in strips. On the far right side the herringbone pattern references the floor in part of the Bruck factory which was parquetry and therefore allowed for movement without cracking because of the heavy machinery. It was actually quite beautiful with the patina it had acquired through the years. A further linocut print echoes the constant circular motions seen in the factories, especially Australian Country Spinners. and also references the balls of wool which are the end product.there. Giant metal rollers hold warps in the Bruck factory and these inspired the applique shapes at the bottom of the piece which are linocut prints.

SHIFT 1

Procion dyeing; collagraph printing; breakdown silk screen printing; linocut printing; reverse applique; raw edge applique; free motion machine stitching using a domestic sewing machine. Cotton fabric; sheer polyester fabric; water soluble fabric printing ink; oil paint; polyester threads; wool/polyester batting.

93 cm h x 92 cm w

2011

I found the huge metal rollers that held the warps in the Bruck factory very interesting and in this piece of work I have tried to convey the continuum of the work and the relentless motion it creates through the repetition of the a design taken from the ends of the rollers. Reference to the woven fabric that is the end product is made in the yellow lines which represent the warps under tension which part to create a “shed” through which the weft passes at great speed.

The two narrow strips are linocut printed with a design which evolved from a photo I took at one of the factories of the time card holders and this references the contribution of all the many workers who make these processes happen.

detail shift 1

Sarah Louise Ricketts

Detail scraper

I am a fringe dweller, like most Australians. We hug the coast, living for the summer and the glow of the beach, the glint of sun on the surf's glass. I live on the urban fringe of the City of Melbourne, pulled by the excitement of people, the bright lights and energy of the crowd. Four million of us, seemingly huddling together against the vast red emptiness at our backs.

Like many Australians, I seldom see the real bones of the landscape of my country. Sometimes, perhaps, from the window of a car or a plane or on the screen of movie. Only very rarely do I look at it with my own eyes. And yet, like most Australians, I am filled with great love for this place. It is a love carried within, a part of us.

When I returned to live in the land of my birth, I understood that attachment to place – my profound love for the curving creek bed, the tree branch angled in welcome, the insolence of mountains – was part of me, no matter where I lived. I carried the hard-won love of the southern land within me to the Middle East and thence to the northern land of my birth. It informs all my work.

Statements about the Work for “Telling Stories”

For “Telling Stories,” I have selected work inspired by a crazy mountain-top race against time and nature through Jordan in the snow with my partner, Geoff Hicks, in 2007; one of my favourite memories of our life together. Geoff lived fast and died young - in 2009. We were building in Carlton at that time. I completed the works, incorporating a roof terrace from which the lights and skyscrapers (to use a now-antiquated but still marvellous term) of Melbourne can be touched. The second piece tells the story of this other life, lived in the realized architecture of a shared dream.

HOLY LAND: SNOW IN PETRA

Hand - stitched painted & felted fabric, deconstructed, reconstructed; coton, wool, silks
156 cm h  x 108 cm w

2007




Sketches, memories and photographs of a too brief but nonetheless compelling tour of Jordan provided the impetus for this work. 

Geoff and I drove to Petra along the mountain spine of the country, in January 2007, with snow dashing about the car and drifts pushed up into formidable banks, where snow had not been in recent memory. The road to Petra was closed behind us as night fell. We made a carefully mad dash toward the town.  The urge to celebrate this experience and to capture something of the haunting spiritual nature of the landscape proved irresistible. 

It is painted cotton wholecloth, felted, dissected and reassembled, stitched, refelted, repainted and assembled onto silk organza ground and frame.

This piece toured the US in 2010, as part of the World of Quilts competition and exhibition series.

detail Holy Land :Snow in Petra

SCRAPER

Nunofelted Fabrics; Hand-Stitching, Machine-Stitched, Silk Organza, Silk Tops, Fleece, Wool Yarns
140 cm h  x 105 cm w

2014

             THE STORY

When the boys and I first moved to Carlton, just on the edge of the city, there was nothing to the immediate south of us.  It did not take very long for a new apartment block to begin its rapid climb to soaring heights, changing our view from flat open blue to the many facets of golden windows.  

At first, I was quite resentful of this looming presence, whose appearance was unwelcome.  However, since it has been inhabited, the building has become some of a friend, a curious companion in the middle of the night when I look up and wonder whose windows are those, and why are they still up?

Surprisingly beautiful arrangements of light and colour are brought about by the random activity of human beings, giving the building life and filling me with a surreptitious delight.  The unwelcome intruder is an unexpected gift.

Detail Scraper

Lesley Goddard

I have always loved colour with its varying shades and the textures of materials. I find it difficult not to rub my hand across a piece of wood, a stone or glassware. Extremely difficult when visiting a gallery and I tend to walk with my hands in my pockets.

I love nature – animals, trees both the shapes and the movement of them in the breeze. The changing colours in the sky and the moods of the sea, the rocks with the water racing over them and the rugged faces of the rock faces are all things which add to my delight in a day.

While teaching in the infant grades I tried to enthuse the children by demonstrating and talking about these things so that they learnt to walk with their eyes open to the world around them and we looked at books to see how the illustrators had drawn a cat for example. I loved each new theme as I could cover my blackboard in chalk drawings and encouraged the children to use crayons and pencils so that they could blend their colours rather than use the flat texta colours. At this stage I would also make a windcheater and paint or sew a picture according to the current theme. Needless to say I ended up with a lot of windcheaters which eventually became a quilt of Australian animals.

Since retiring from teaching I have been able to indulge a wish to make a quilt after seeing one which was a palette of such vivid colours that you wanted to wrap yourself in it. I took myself of to classes; followed directions faithfully, branched out tried another; began my vivid quilt and I was hooked. I became part of a small group who enthused one another but I wanted more than just sewing other peoples designs. I wanted to add my own stamp on them by adding texture and using a variety of materials.

To accomplish this I attended workshops in Melbourne, Geelong, Horsham, Beaufort and our own groups within Warrnambool. In one group that I belong to we meet once a month and challenge ourselves to try to learn a new skill or use a new material. We often rely on magazines or books to do this.

At the moment I am attending TAFE and doing a second year of Machine Embroidery which is helping me to gain new techniques and confidence.

Alaska

Blue cotton material; photos of Alaska printed onto calico; hand pieced diamond shapes into long lines. Colour washed the quilt from light to dark representing sky to the depths of the ocean. Machine stitched the photos as if they were the diamond pieces and then machine embroidered the photos to add texture to the glaciers, seals. After discussion, regarding the designs to represent water, snowflakes and the sea, Yvonne McCrae machine quilted it for me.

136 x 211 cm

Began in October 2010 - finished 2011

While travelling I enjoy visiting patchwork and craft shops.  Most of the blue material was bought while travelling up the east coast and others were swapped with friends.  I completed a family history quilt but still had a lot of blue material.  

I had learnt about glaciers while studying geography in Form 6 and had always been keen to visit Alaska and so, on retirement, Alaska was included in a trip overseas.  I did not see a polar bear but I was inspired to try and make a quilt using some photos.

It took me several years before I started and a need to acquire some turquoise blues.  The size of the pieces and the decision to hand piece was because my husband had to go into hospital and I needed some handwork that I could do while I was with him.  The photos needed to remain as whole photos otherwise I lost too much of the photo when I cut them into diamond shapes - hence the stitching to make it look similar in design.  I enjoy machine embroidery so decided to add some texture to the photos.  My decision to have this quilt machine quilted by Yvonne was two-fold.  One, I had hand pieced it and secondly my machine needed servicing and I appreciated the discussion about the design and the completed job.

I am never completely sure how a quilt will look as I have an overall picture in my mind but as I do not work from a pattern, I depend upon the look of it as I lay it out and allow the colours and the design to influence my decisions.

Detail Alaska

LESLEY’S VERSION OF ‘DEAR JANE’

Red cotton material; calico - seed muslin. Machine stitched, hand stitched and appliqued blocks. Colour washed.

159 x 159 cm

Began in approximately 2005 - Restarted in 2011 Finished in 2012

 A "Dear Jane"Quilt has 225 patterns which date back to 1863 from the Jane A Stickie Quilt.  Her quilt has inspired countless people by the story behind the quilt and others by the mathematiacal geometric designs.  I decided to begin a quilt based on her idea hoping to improve my techniques and to become more precise in cutting and piecing.  Initiallly, a started with a friend and we used blocks from a book called "501 Quilt Blocks".  After many interruptions, I joined a group of women whe met once a month to wowrk on the various blocks from the Dear Jane book.  We would work on one or two blocks that night at the quilt shop and endeavour to make a few more before we met the following month.  Group participation led to much talking, and a further block quilt purely because we enjoyed the process and the social contact.   

   I had originally decided to make the blocks in red plus the calico and continued this when I joined the group.  I kept a sketch book of my blocks plus a detailed plaln of placement plus a chart of the pieces of material used in each block.  

 Rather than waste the original blocks I made, even though they were smaller, I added them to my design arouond the edges and colour washed the quilt.

This quilt is not an exact copy of a "Dear Jane"quilt nor is it as precise as quilter may wish but it was an achievement on my part and I learnt a lot in the process and met many new friends.

   

Dear Jane detail

Dont forget to check "older posts" below right for Robina Summers, Toni Warrell, Olga Walters, Anne Sushames and Fiona Wright.
                      

Robina Summers

Detail Vanishing?

I work  both as a photographer and a textile artist. I often find that in designing a photograph it will often help the design emerge for a quilt. On the other hand the design of a textile piece will often lead to a freer photograph. My work comes from the heart and, whether a photograph or textile piece, starts as a formal design determined by the theme of a particular exhibition. The meditative process of stitching stimulates my subconscious mind and will often dictate the emotional direction a work goes in. I find it impossible to make any work without an underlying statement about something I believe in. That doesn't meant it has to be serious, it can also be light hearted and fun. I continually find that that nothing is ever quite straightforward, visually or intellectually so that my art photographs are frequently manipulated to bend the straight lines and I find it physically impossible to sew a straight line. Quite a contrast, maybe even a reaction against the commercial world where I will pursue exacting reality in a photograph for a client.

I thoroughly enjoy workshops which I often find are a two-way inspiration.

My alter world is as a yarnbomber - or as some would prefer to call it - urban knitting, or even urban art installation. Its heartwarming fun facilitating community projects that soften cold hard reality with wool!

Along with Toni Warrell and Olga Walters I belong to the Star Quilters of Warrandyte where we make almost traditional quilts. We quilt for ourselves but like all quilting groups, big and small, the Stars devote time and materials to making quilts for others in need of comfort - from special care babies to fire and flood victims. The very first group quilt we made twenty years ago when we were beginners was for a charity auction. I never cease to be amazed at the generosity of all quilters everywhere- I guess its a pastime that easily lends itself to providing comfort for others.

When I have spare time (when????) I also blog about yarnbombing, quilting, people and many other things . Just google "Wild Yarns & Stuff"

Nostalgia

Silk organza & habutai, machine & hand embroidery, beads. Wool blanketing, eucalyptus, tea & kangaroo apple dye. Beads.

151 x 126 cm

We never fly when we work interstate. If we possibly can we drive.  We grew up in a time when that's what you did during the holidays.  We grew up loving the main streets in country towns.  They were thriving, busy  places.

Motels didnt exist.  We stayed in country pubs.  They had their own smell - even now, rarely, walking past an old building in the country, that smell will waft out of a doorway, creating a sense of loss for time past.  Shopping stopped at one oçlock on a Saturday, Sunday lunch wa a roast with family.  People grew wonderful flower and vegetable gardens, clothes dried on a Hill's Hoist, the baker delivered bread with a horse and cart and so did the milkman. 

Of course, these things happened in suburban Melbourne, but nothing in the the city remains to remind us of those childhood memories.  For no logical reason, country towns bring back romanticised memories of our lucky childhood and a desire to delve into times past, even times well before our own.

Se we drive and stop in modern motels, and then we walk, cameras in hand, obsessed by buildings of all ages.  Glimpses of many generations past - many have new uses  Lots of old banks are now restaurants, offices and medical rooms.  (I actually get really excited to see a very old bank building still in use as a bank).  In some towns, grand old emporiums lie abandoned.

Detail \Nostalgia

In some towns, grand old emporiums like abandoned.  That's very sad, what were they  like in their hey day - what sort of people shopped there, what did they buy, how did they live?  I could go on forever - instead, here's just a selection of memories from one drive north.

  I have arranged them inside the framework of a piece of ironwork on an old balcony in Armidale, New South Wales.  Look at them and let your imagination run riot about all the lives that have been led behind those doors and windows.  

EUCALYPTUS POLYANTHEMUS

Handwoven with synthetic thread and tissue organza, hand & machine stitching, beads, paint, wool blanketing, eucalyptus & tea dye.

88 cm w x 170 cm h

2014

When I was nineteen, I came back from 12 months overseas and started a course at RMIT.  Directly opposite was the then, National Gallery of Victoria.  When I should have been in the library fI spent many hours trawling the art.

On one of my first visits, I stumbled, almost literally, such was the effect, across Fred McCubbin's "The Pioneer".  Looking at it I could actually smell the bush I hadn't been in for probably eighteen months.  A visit to Eltham the following weekend made me realise just how very much I had missed it - odd as I always wanted to bean ïnner city girl""

When we married we lived in the inner city.  One day on a weekend escape to Warrandyte, we fell in love with a tree covered block and subsequently moved right into the bush.  It was a block covered in Eucalyptus Polyanthemus - red box.  Since then we have moved further into the bush.

Detail Eucalylptus Polyanthemus

When the "Red Box"winery opened I was asked to make a quilt celebrating the tree for the opening.  By chance I discovered a skeleton leaf on our drive - perfect for a design.  Since then I have reworked this quilt as my love affair with the red box has certainly not decreased.  It makes the most beautiful imprints on wool and imparts it's wonderful leaf smell into the fabric at the same time.  I am very happy for you to "touch and sniff" the woollen blanket layer.

VANISHING ?

Silk organza & habutai, machine & hand embroidery, beads. Wool blanketing, eucalyptus, tea & kangaroo apple dye. Beads.

151 x 126 cm

detail Vanishing?

2014 I love the bush.  The community I live in protects and cares for a small area of bush on the Yarra River on the outskirts of Melbourne.  Then there were those terrible firest.  Our community was by good fortune only, physically untouched.  But the whole of Melbourne felt the sadness.  Withing our community neighbours lost immediate family members, all of us lost friends and the romantic innocence of bush living vanished.

Its several years on now and its taken time for all of us to start to feel normal, some never will.

     

Despite that, the passion we all have for living in the bush has, if anything, increased - the burn areas and storm damage remind us of how fragile it can be.  We celebrate its existence all through the year.  There are now fears for its future - seed banks can disappear with fire and plants can vanish forever.  The earth is warmer now and is drier deep down because rain has trouble penetrating very ground making it more difficult for trees to cope.  And, there is less rain too.  I can see the bush has changed, our orchids are not as prolific and some of the trees are battling.  Near my house, beautiful candlebarks that are many decades old have inexplicably fallen over.

Were this bush to vanish, we would all be affected by its loss.  The woollen back of this quilt is covered in imprints of eucalypt leaves - please lift the delicate front to see what's underneath - even sniff the wool, its kept the smell of the leaves.