Gilded Cage

Spending time in Takayna curtesy of the Bob Brown Foundation’s Art for Takyana Residency, I wanted to explore why governments selectively preserve one part of nature but then allow the destruction of another? Occasionally forestry preserves a specimen tree or a remnant of forest. Why not preserve it all? Why log old growth forests that are full of ancient wonder? This work is part of a series that endeavours to grapple with this rabid destruction. Using the concept of “nature” living inside a gilded cage, this work examines the beautiful, the precious, the exotic being trapped by splendour and without freedom, ultimately coming to a demise. Becoming an allegory for how we treat and preserve nature.

To create this work I knitted for 150 hours a brass wire blanket. This blanket was taken into Takayna and photographed draped over trees, mosses and ferns.