Immersion
Conversations from the Swamp Residencies
Introduction by the Curators
Working from Gundungarra, Dharag and Wiradjuri countries artists are documenting mountain and valley swamps in a project that has become affectionately known as The Swamp Residencies. Creative swamp research is occurring over a year, artists observing habitats flourishing in peat beds millions of years old and sharing conversations with peers, science and wider community.
The works in the Immersion exhibition document swamp ecosystems as diverse in ecology as these artists span in their artistic practice. Interpretations of printmaking, drawing, installation, film, painting, photography and a song of recorded swamp sounds revegetate an ex industrial area; the Articulate Project Space in Leichhardt.
The Greater Blue Mountains World Heritage area retains a plethora of original, accomplished and interesting art and science activity due to numerous historical conservation efforts, to preserve an incredible environmental prosperity. It was indeed a conversation about the beauty and biodiversity of upland swamps during the Bushfire Recovery Print Project that encouraged the beginnings of the Swamp Residency project.
An understanding of the evolution of complex swamp ecosystems has been enriched by time spent with the Blue Mountains City Council Aquatic Systems crew, and an analysis of local macroinvertebrates, creating further opportunities to question and learn.
Culturally, Indigenous Peoples value swamps as repositories of biodiversity, providing sustainable food sources and as meeting and resting places. In contrast, resource hungry cultures across the world have viewed swamps as wastelands, to be drained for development and harvested for peat.
The Swamp Residencies exhibition re-imagines familiar urban places that we know and walk daily prior to their urbanisation, immersed in the full magnificence of Australian bushland. This has been an extraordinarily blessed experience and a pleasure to work with all the incredible artists herein.
Freedom Wilson and Justin Morrissey
