Meet the Elements Artists
An ephemeral sculpture exhibition set amongst the stunning backdrop of the Maroochy Botanic Gardens, Elements will take you on a tour of five contemporary artists’ interpretations of nature and place. Running across the ten days of the festival, the magnificent Gardens will be transformed from an 82 hectare natural paradise to a contemporary outdoor gallery, exhibiting works from leading local and national artists who have drawn inspiration from the elements; fire, earth, air, and water.
Meet the artists who are creating magic in the Botanic Gardens...
Mari Hirata
Mari Hirata is a visual artist and silversmith based in Brisbane. Born in Japan and immigrating to Australia in 1992, her work often draws on aesthetics and sensibilities of traditional Japanese art and design.
Mari’s Elements work is titled ‘NEWOXY: Sentinels,’ and responds to the element of air. Mari shares, “Ever since I was a child growing up in Japan, I have had a deep affinity with trees, the bush, and mountains. One of the more immediately notable things that makes me feel different - followed by an immediate sense of ease - is when I focus on my breath and notice the scent and the quality of the air when surrounded by the trees.”
Mari will construct and install a series of sculptures formed from recycled industrial air-conditioning ducts. The fluidity of this found, industrial material will be physically manipulated and translated into forms characteristic of a chrysalis or an exoskeleton that further suggest the possibility of some kind of a living entity within. The installation will take these artificial visceral forms that are almost reminiscent of fibrous body parts, and reinserting them into the natural landscape of the Maroochy Botanical Bushland. The conceptual framework aims to juxtapose and amalgamate the seemingly disparate systems of the bushland and the city allowing for a re-examination of our relationships to nature, and perhaps suggest a new kind of hybrid nature in this increasingly industrialised, disposable world.
Mari Hirata Artist Talk: Sunday 25th August, 11-11:30am
Kim Schoenberger
Kim Schoenberger is a Queensland based artist whose practice is object and installation based, informed by recycled materials and an ongoing interest in domestic and feminine tropes. Kim brings a political element to her work, be it an exploration of human relationships, a concern for the natural environment or bringing a lens to humanity’s interaction with nature, she feels compelled to utilise her creative practise to comment.
Kim’s Elements piece, ‘Untitled [H20],’ is an installation of a sculptural water drop, featured in a natural chimney created by fire and decay in the trunk of a tree. The droplet will be constructed in highly polished stainless steel, with a limited patchwork of contrasting textures and finishes including atrophied paint, bare metal and rust, while the surface will be marred with the epigraphical maculation of its creation through human intervention and manipulation.
The sculpture will be suspended in the hollow to create a lens of negative space, alerting the audience to the lack of a thriving micro-environment, much like the dry and desolate river banks of the Murray Darling. In ‘Untitled [H2O]’ Kim is looking to not only shine a light on the mismanagement of water resources such as the Murray-Darling River, but to reflect upon an issue that is endemic in the administration of our natural heritage.
As part of the Elements work, Kim will also be presenting a family friendly workshop on the construction of clay “water drops,” inspired by 'Untitled [H20]'. In this workshop each participant will be guided through several clay-making techniques including, pinch, slab and textured relief work while imbedding various textures of reclaimed steel objects into the clay to realise their creations.
Workshop 1: Saturday 24th August, 1-2:30pm
Workshop 2: Monday 26th August, 1-2:30pm
Kim Schoenberger Artist Talk: Saturday 24th August, 11-11:30am
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Lincoln Austin
Lincoln Austin is known for his sculptural and multi-media works employing geometry, optics, material and scale to playfully explore the blurred boundaries between Ideal and Physical realities, “Making art allows me to play, in a tangible and lasting way, with ideas which excite, astound, and confuse me”. Austin employs art to investigate ideas circulating around notions of perception. More specifically how perception effects experience and understanding, and how varied interaction can alter that perception. This analysis of perception has prompted him to make art that often requires the movement of the viewer to ‘activate’ the work.
Lincoln’s Elements piece, ‘The Wind Forms,’ consists of three site conditioned sculptural artworks which employ the aesthetics and materials of apparatus associated with adventure sports. These works engage the wind and gravity to complete their forms and activate their kinetic potential.
Kite-Making Workshop:
Workshop 1: Saturday 31st August, 1-3pm
Workshop 2: Sunday 1st September, 1-3pm
Lincoln Austin Artist Talk: Sunday 1st September, 11-11.30am
Lyndon Davis
Lyndon Davis is a local Aboriginal Artist, Educator and Cultural performer. Lyndon was born and raised on the Sunshine Coast, and is a Traditional Custodian and representative of the Local Gubbi Gubbi / Kabi Kabi people. Lyndon has worked extensively within our local community for the past 20 years, presenting an exciting and informative Indigenous Cultural Education Program for local schools, Universities and staff Cultural Awareness Training.
In 1997 Lyndon founded the Gubbi Gubbi Dance Troupe, bringing together local Aboriginal artists and performers. Presenting an amazing display of Traditional Aboriginal Song and Dance. Their reputation has grown as one of the best Traditional Dance Troupes in Qld..
Lyndon Davis Artist Talk: Friday 23rd August, 11-11:30am
Warraba Weatherall
This work is a selection of artist, Warraba Weatherall sculptural installation exhibition from InstitutionaLies, which showed at Metro Arts in 2017. The distilled version will comprise of 3-5 carved trees and cages which will be positioned in the bush and inspired by the element of earth.
The cages are modelled off Victorian era bird cages but with the dimensions of a human body. The carved trees are also used in mortuary rights for Kamilaroi peoples but within the InstitutionaLies exhibition, referenced Aboriginal deaths in custody.
Weatherall interest and rational is a continuation from the original body of work, originally it was looking to how natural and cultural materials are stolen from their environment and collected and studied as curiosities. He is interested in this iteration to explore how the dissected trees are now foreign forms within their own environment and consider the impacts of human interventions.
Warraba Weatherall Artist Talk: Friday 30th August, 11-11:30am
