Allegorical representations of invasive species
Since the early 2000s, I have been investigating the attitudes towards migrants using invasive species as a metaphor. In many of them were initially cultivated for their culinary or medicinal purposes.
On Christmas Day in 1859, Thomas Austin released a couple of dozen pairs of rabbits from his property near Geelong in Victoria. The population would spread across multiple state borders. My most recent artwork about the phenomena was installed at Logan Art Gallery in 2022.
During the mid-2000s, I also developed a series of papercuts about the widely deplored cane toad.
The 3-legged toad is considered a symbol for wealth, in reference to the befriending of such a mythical creature by Liu Hai. The latter was a tenth century government official who was deified in Taoism.
The artwork also plays on the troupe: inside every fat person, there is a skinny person trying to get out.
Do migrants desire to assimilate with the communities they enter, or consume them?
Amongst the series I have been developing about invasive flora, is one equating the abuse of alcohol to their presence in non-cosmopolitan areas.
Prohibition was inspired by the discarded drink containers I found in the bush during the 2008 federal government intervention in the Northern Territory.
Their designs have been embellished with floral motifs representing invasive species, which have medicinal applications. The choice of copper reflects the material’s use to make drinking vessels in Mesopotamia. Beer was also brewed in this ancient society.
The series questions whether the value attributed to any entity might be dependent upon its context.
