“Home among the gum trees
I woke this morning,
in my nice, soft blanketed bed
to the smell of smoke.
I arose and looked out the window,
my view of the sea was gone,
instead the gumtrees were shrouded
and the morning light had an evening glow.
My first thought was for those
who have no home to wake in,
no view of blue, but of blackened ash,
and who’s lungs will remember
their grief for years to come.
Blackened homes, on roads to nowhere,
gumtrees lost, birds flown, koalas gone,
DNA extinguished.
My saggar fires houses were inspired,
by blackened homes of long ago,
soot from internal fires
in homes built in previous times,
when coal was our only means to warm our souls.
Today they sit on memories,
drawn from time spent in the bush.
We love to live among the gum trees,
but where is our roadmap for where to go now?”
When Katika Schultz aka @skullsbykat invited me to submit an entry to @yaw_way_platform’s end of year show themed “Home” I immediately thought of my little saggar fired houses but in the weeks leading up to the show (and still as I write), we had such terrible bushfires across the country, they took on another meaning and the morning I was due to deliver them, I awoke to the smell of smoke, words of prose and a new way to present them.
I took an earlier illustration of gum leaves and made a larger ink on paper illustration, a kind of map of where to place them and titled it “Home amongst the gum trees” which is also the opening line of a song used in a now antiquated gardening show.
My heart goes out to all those directly effected by the fires and those still fighting bushfires in other parts. I hope as a country we can find a way forward so we can still live amongst the gum trees.
The exhibition ran over the weekend Sat 23rd & Sun 24th November in the Sunk Bar at Narrabeen RSL in Sydney, which has been @yaw_way_platform’s home since it’s inception earlier this year.
For anyone interested, saggar firing is where ceramics are placed in a closed container filled with natural materials such as gum leaves. The smoke from the leaves infuses into the clay when fired. The shine on the rooftops cames from polishing the clay before bisque firing.