Ephemera - 2016

My work for Ephemera was created in residence at the New England Regional Art Museum in Armidale, NSW. The studio opened onto Black Gully, the site of recent extensive environmental restoration. My project utilised clay dug from the gully 30 meters from the studio. The clay was processed by hand to remove the larger rocks and sticks, then mixed with native plant seed collected by local botanists from in and around Black Gully. The seeded clay was formed into sculptures and returned to the banks of Black Gully in its raw form. Within a few days, the rains came and began to break the clay back down into the soil along with the seeds. Later in the summer, the first signs of germination appeared. Only the wattle species germinated. When I revisited the site in 2025, some of these specimens were already over 4 meters tall.