*NOTE FOR THE DOBELL PANEL:

This is a sample video presenting 20 of the 242 drawings. The completed video of the 242 pieces will present exactly the same, except for duration (40m20s on loop). To be shown on a large, vertically orientated monitor, each image appearing full-frame. Silent in the gallery, with sound aspect via headphones (or sound on in gallery, if suitable).

The two repetitive sounds aspects, Boo Book Owl and passing passenger jet overhead, are personally emblematic of a majestic aloneness, intrinsic to where I live and work on land bordering the Barringgi Gadyin /Wimmera River. The 242 drawings map an equally majestic, post Pandemic, re engagement with others ... a balancing of the ledger.

Cascade 2022/2023

Charcoal, pastel & paint on paper and collage on canvas boards

242 boards in order of making, total 195H x 279W cm

(12.7 x 17.8 cm each)

In October 2022, as the pandemic subsided, I began making quick portrait-based collages at my local Natimuk Café and then drove to Mr Hope Café in Bermagui, NSW, to continue the process. I was on a mission to simply sit with others and again revel in a wash of humanity. On returning home, this dance continued in my every-day for one year - at work, in waiting rooms, on trains... where ever I encountered others. The paper drawing ‘plates’ were made from my life-admin scraps - relentless lists, bills, notes to self, etc - and on the back were glued pages from the Bible, including from one left on the back seat of an old Volvo given to me. They ended up more psychological than polite portraits, possibly as much about the maker as the sitter, a collective swab or mark of our shared existence at that moment in time.

Drawing is a desperate and nourishing grin and grimace at the fine line between joy and grief, allowing me to filter the good, bad and in-between of the global, national, personal and every-day ... religion, politics, environment, health, family, land, etc. The Bible figured heavily in my formative years, as it has in the Wimmera and Australia generally. Its inclusion continues my compulsion to grab and juxtapose  what surfaces intuitively and presents by chance.