RONA18 Regional Events

Explore the Regional Events happening across Australia in the section below!

This exhibition will consist of the Dobby, Young Tree Kangaroo book, watercolour paintings of my visit to Far North Queensland and mixed media sculptures fabricated by Margaret Worthington and Clive Rouse.

Statement by Liz Barker:

As an artist, I make creek prints in rivers. I stand ankle or shin deep in the water and place my paper on the waters surface and gently peel it off again. I then dry and varnish them. The prints are beautiful and lyrical and they sing songs of the river. Songs of decay. Songs of new life. Songs of cycles. The surface scum is made up of phytoplankton, which is the base of the oceanic food web. Collectively these microscopic organisms while floating around on the surface level of the worlds oceans and waterways, provide up to 80% of the worlds oxygen through photosynthesis. This surface scum is source of all life on this planet. It is in this way that the creek prints are guiding me into the world of science. Perhaps they are the maps themselves. Landmarks along the way. They are non linear pathways, maps to unknown places, maps of the river themselves. A glimpse of the beauty of the whole. A journey back to wholeness.

This is a collaborative exhibition that explores these meandering maps and pathways. My creek prints are featured in digital format for the first time, presented on a large screen. But this exhibition is primarily about giving an aesthetic expression to Tom’s PhD research. Finding ways to make parts of his findings more accessible through visual means. Tom and I are aligned in our values and views of the world. Yet somehow we come from very different angles to reach the same perspective. Working with artist, poet and dancer Louisa Miranda the three of us are curating his research. Curating science into art. Tom, Louisa and I worked together in Bangkok making prints like these from the overburdened waterways around the city. Almost 20 years have passed and this exhibition marks our creative and scientific reunion.

Along with the prints we take sonic recordings of the submarine environment, documenting more-than-human entanglements with the riparian setting through poetry and creative writing, while scientifically analysing the health of the waterways over time.

For more details, see the artist’s Facebook page: The Planet Spins.

The Australian Earth Laws Alliance (AELA) is hosting Rights of Nature Australia 2018 (RONA18), a series of connected events that explore and promote the rights of nature to exist, thrive and evolve. RONA18 involves a Peoples Tribunal and arts events around Australia, during October.

Sunshine Coast artists have responded with an Earth Arts Festival, bringing together the Arts and Sustainable Living. Join us for a drug & alcohol free, family fun day, at the Nambour Community Centre.