Stu Murphy captured by drone, deep in the Grafton wetlands
11 am Saturday August 24
Free
Lone Goat Gallery
Join artist Stu Murphy for a walk and talk through his exhibition, exploring wetlands and swamps in the Clarence and Grafton regions. With special guest Cassie Price, Director of Habitat Programs OzFish
Stu Murphy's exhibition Pause invites people to briefly stop, look and think about our wetlands. The contribution that wetlands make to our big blue ball is huge, but here in our own neighbourhood we’ve largely abused them. Altering natural hydrology always comes back to bite you and these photos show what we’re doing right here, right now.
The aerial images are stunning and capture lines, textures, marks and patterns created by birds that just have to be seen to be believed. The colours reflected off the surface can be startlingly beautiful from electric blues to super soft earthy tones.
I think it’s important to show people what our wetlands look like. Your average wetland in the NSW north coast is difficult to see. The majority are on private land and being on a floodplain it can be hard to find an elevated spot to see these expanses of water and plants. I’m a swamp guy, I just like them. The weird creepy frog sounds, the beautiful green sedges and the expanse just kind of hits the mark.
Each image has a story which inevitably involves human interference in the landscape in some way. An interference that in some photos is obvious to the eye such as a fence line and some more difficult to detect like changes in soil chemistry triggered by altered hydrology. The interference can result in stark contrasts in vegetation within an image or crazy intense colours coupled with seemingly absurd surface textures.
Joining Stu for the talk will be Cassie Price, Director of Habitat Programs OzFish
Cassie is driven by a passion for sustainable resources, a love of fishing and her farming background. Her career spans almost 20 years in wetlands, aquatic habitat restoration and sustainable agriculture, predominantly in NSW and Queensland. Cass has a unique understanding of wetland and fish ecology and is enthusiastic about community driven conservation from her 15 years working with NGOs WetlandCare Australia and more recently with Landcare NSW and OzFish Unlimited.
The talk will begin at 11am, and the gallery will be open until 4pm on Saturday with Stu Murphy in attendance to meet and talk with visitors about his work.
Free, and all welcome.