Image:
Erub Arts and Ghost Net Collective artists with the work
At Home Together 2020
Ghost net, Rope, Twine over Wire Frame
190cm x 190cm x 20cm
30th Jun — 3rd Sep 2023
Simpson Gallery
Artists
Aunty Desiree Walker
Erub Arts Torres Strait | Emma Gela, Florence Gutchen, Lavinia Ketchell, Racy Oui-Pitt, Ellarose Savage, Jimmy John Thaiday, and Jimmy K Thaiday
Ghost Net Collective | Marion Gaemers and Lynnette Griffiths
Interwoven: Stories of Country from North and South draws together artworks from north Queensland and north east Victorian artists to tell stories of community, environment, and connection to Country.
Benalla-based artist and proud local Elder, Aunty Desiree Walker presents new work woven from natural fibres. Aunty Desiree’s work includes a large-scale eel trap, woven using traditional methods she re-interprets through her art practice, and passes on to future generations through workshops.
The exhibition flows from the creeks and rivers of north east Victoria to the oceans of north Queensland with an immersive installation of solo and collective works by artists from Erub Arts and Ghost Net Collective. All works are created from various plastic polymers (ghost nets and rope) recovered from the environment. Interwoven: Stories of Country from North and South culminates with a three-metre, suspended coral bommie by Marion Gaemers and Lynnette Griffiths, circled by woven stingrays, bait fish, and a shark variously contributed by Gaemers, Griffiths, and Erub Artists Emma Gela, Florence Gutchen, Lavinia Ketchell, Racy Oui-Pitt, Ellarose Savage, Jimmy John Thaiday, and Jimmy K Thaiday.
About Aunty Desiree Walker:
Born and raised in Sorrento, Aunty Desiree Walker moved to Melbourne in her early adulthood, and has lived and worked in Benalla for the past 23 years. She has a background working as a deep sea fisher, then began nursing from the age of 18, continuing to work in this space for over twenty years including at Dromana Hospital and various hospitals in Melbourne. Aunty Desiree then turned to studying welfare, and while studying she worked alongside Father Bob Maguire at Emerald Hill Mission, before working for Rumbalara Family Services as a family worker, and then performing psychosocial mental health work for AWAHS and Mind Australia.
Her passion for weaving was fostered nearly twenty years ago through a series of workshops presented by Palawa Elders at the Shepparton-Mooroopna Causeway KidsTown. Aunty Desiree continued to practice weaving for many years, before dedicating herself to her practice in the last four years. She explains that it is an outlet that she “just loves. In recent years it’s come from the people that surround me. I call for spiritual inspiration and it comes to me.” Beyond those early workshops, her weaving technique is largely self-taught, seeking reference texts to allow her to re-interpret traditional methods, and to learn from mistakes.
Aunty Desiree Walker has exhibited and delivered workshops at North East Artisans, Benalla Art Gallery, GANEAA, and local schools, and also featured in Women of Our Land, an exhibition by North East Victorian Artists presented at the Wangaratta Visitor Information Centre in 2020.
About Erub Arts Torres Strait:
Erub (Darnley Island) is the most north-eastern of the Torres Strait Islands, and home to approximately 400 Erubam le (Erub people) whose seafaring heritage has traditions of elaborately decorated canoes, carved stone, intricate dance costumes, and weaponry. Stories of creation and significant community events are passed down through song, dance and adornment – keeping cultural traditions and practices vibrantly and dynamically alive.
Erub Arts’ Vision is to maintain a strong Erubian identity and to promote culture in a contemporary way through art. Erub artists are from four tribal groups and draw artistic inspiration from their identity and connection to their totems through both traditional and contemporary stories about their land, sea and family connections.
Historically, Erub relied on strong trade links and relationships with the people of Papua New Guinea and south to Cape York. Today, Erub Arts creative practice continues to evolve at a contemporary level by its willingness to collaborate with outside artists and celebrate cross cultural exchange. Erub Arts showcase works using traditional and modern mediums, and are informed by historical stories from pre-contact, first contact and missionary contact, alongside contemporary stories about living culture, the land, sea and sky.
To learn more about Erub Arts Torres Strait, click here.
About Ghost Net Collective:
Ghost Net Collective member artists have been working with reclaimed fishing nets since 2010. Founding members Lynnette Griffiths and Marion Gaemers have extended the collaborative ethos of working as they create messages of life, death, hunting, and preservation using marine debris.
They worked extensively with Erub Arts and their first large-scale group installation was at the Oceanographic Museum in Monaco in 2016. By 2020 they had grown and developed as a group, however during COVID they had to create new methodologies to work and keep growing. Thus, Ghost Net Collective was formed. The work which had begun from a mentor model had developed into collaboration in a true cross-cultural environment and now there were opportunities for education, workshops and large-scale public installations. The group is now able to include individuals and wider community involvement. This collaborative approach has created the opportunity for artists and crafts people from everywhere to be involved as they wish.
To learn more about Ghost Net Collective, click here.
Benalla Art Gallery Exhibition Partners
