Colin Suggett’s Back Off, Pal By Catherine Watson
BASS Coast artists were at the forefront of the long community campaign against the desalination plant.
Fittingly, several have returned for a new exhibition, Oceans, Whales & Other Sea Creatures, which opened in Wonthaggi's Artspace Community Gallery this week.
The exhibition has been curated by Whalewatch, the group set up in 2010 in response to the claim by Peter Garrett, the then federal environmental minister, that Bass Coast was not an important area for migrating whales.
BASS Coast artists were at the forefront of the long community campaign against the desalination plant.
Fittingly, several have returned for a new exhibition, Oceans, Whales & Other Sea Creatures, which opened in Wonthaggi's Artspace Community Gallery this week.
The exhibition has been curated by Whalewatch, the group set up in 2010 in response to the claim by Peter Garrett, the then federal environmental minister, that Bass Coast was not an important area for migrating whales.
 Lisa Schonberg’s Humpbacks off Cowes  Geoff Glare’s Southern right whale, Waratah Bay, 2010.  Ray Dahlstrom’s Acid Ocean | In that first year the group recorded 133 humpback whales, 18 southern right whales, a handful of killer whales, a great white shark and some 220 dolphins between Phillip Island and Wilsons Prom. Mr Garrett’s troubled parliamentary career is almost over, the Wonthaggi desalination plant has been built and mothballed, along with most of Australia’s other desalination plants, and Whalewatch has gone from strength to strength. Now in its fourth season, it’s collated hundreds of sightings, which Whalewatch founder Mark Robertson says will provide valuable data for facing future threats to the coast, whether it be a gas plant, nuclear plant or expansion of the Port of Hastings. There are also plans for a Whalewatch Facebook site and a self-guided tour app of likely whale-watching spots for tourists. When the committee of the Wonthaggi Artspace Community Gallery invited Whalewatch to mount an exhibition, the group jumped at the opportunity. Robertson said there was a ready response from artists, with entries of ceramics, sculptures, photographs, cartoons and paintings celebrating our oceans and ocean life. Most of the artists had a connection with the long but ultimately unsuccessful campaign to stop a desalination plant being built next to the Bunurong Marine Park. Some of the anger and political comment remains. Ray Dahlstrom’s Acid Ocean (epoxy resin) is a comment on rising acidity levels in the ocean. |
Susan Hall’s Plastic on Plastic, made from discarded hay bale netting and pallet plastic, is a comment on human waste. One of Lisa Schoenberg’s photos depicts a seal enmeshed in plastic netting.
There are also four of Colin Suggett’s celebrated cartoons, which so cleverly punctured the government and industry rhetoric and misinformation surrounding the desal plant.
Several works by Artspace’s regular artists, most notably Martin Keogh’s menacing Flake, have been co-opted for the exhibition.
There’s also an international element with two photographs of environmental art installations from the organisers of a group campaigning against a desalination plant proposed for the mouth of the Hudson River in New York. The photos will be auctioned at Saturday’s opening of the exhibition with the proceeds to go back to the New York campaign.
Oceans, Whales & Other Sea Creatures: Wonthaggi Artspace Community Gallery, August 1-26.
There are also four of Colin Suggett’s celebrated cartoons, which so cleverly punctured the government and industry rhetoric and misinformation surrounding the desal plant.
Several works by Artspace’s regular artists, most notably Martin Keogh’s menacing Flake, have been co-opted for the exhibition.
There’s also an international element with two photographs of environmental art installations from the organisers of a group campaigning against a desalination plant proposed for the mouth of the Hudson River in New York. The photos will be auctioned at Saturday’s opening of the exhibition with the proceeds to go back to the New York campaign.
Oceans, Whales & Other Sea Creatures: Wonthaggi Artspace Community Gallery, August 1-26.