Ephemera: Seaside Sculptures Exhibition Publication

17-25 July 2021

Celebrating 20 years of Sun, Sea and Art

Lama’gan © Jordan Wyles 2021

Townsville City Council acknowledges the Wulgurukaba of Gurambilbarra and Yunbenun, Bindal, Gugu Badhun and Nywaigi as the Traditional Owners of this land. We pay our respects to their cultures, their ancestors, and their Elders, past and present - and all future generations.

Lama’gan © Jordan Wyles 2021

Contents Introduction Message from the Mayor

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Foreword 5 Sponsors 6 Strand Ephemera 2019 Winners

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Ephemera 2021 Overview

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Artworks Artwork Overview

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Ephemera map

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Artists and Artwork information

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Get Involved Education and Schools Overview

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Inspector Clouseau’s Treasure Hunt

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wilson/ryan/grose Lawyers People’s Choice Award

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Photography Competition

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Other Events North Australian Festival of Arts

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PUNQ 81 Perc Tucker Regional Gallery

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Message from the Mayor Townsville City Council is proud to present Ephemera, our much-loved and highlyanticipated biennial sculptural festival which is celebrating its 20th year of sun, sand, and sensational art in 2021.

Presented along our city’s picturesque beachfront The Strand, Ephemera will showcase 29 sculptures by local and nationally-renowned artists, including 20 competitive sculptures, four sculptures by invited artists, two schools projects, two projection artists and two chalk artists.

As part of Ephemera’s 20th celebration this year, an exciting new acquisitive prize category has been added thanks to funding by the Queensland Government.

The acquisitive prize will be awarded to one artwork, with the sculpture to call the Strand home as part of our permanent sculpture display.

Winter in Townsville is festival season, with Ephemera coinciding with the North Australian Festival of Arts (NAFA).

NAFA is our world-class cultural event season which also includes the Australian Festival of Chamber Music (AFCM), the Northern Fringe Festival and Pop Up North Queensland festival (PUNQ).

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It has been wonderful to see the community support each other through the COVID-19 pandemic, and the Townsville City Council team has worked hard to deliver a COVIDsafe festival that allows our community to celebrate together and grow upon our region’s cultural and artistic identity.

I would like to thank each team member, volunteer, sponsor and artist that has dedicated their time and energy to the success of Ephemera over the past 20 years. Without such talented people and exciting ideas Ephemera would simply not be what is today, and I feel incredibly privileged and proud to be part of such an event.

Ephemera is one of the highlights of the region’s arts calendar and showcases Townsville when the climate is magnificent.

I encourage everyone to visit Ephemera and support our artistic heritage and creative community. Enjoy the festival.

Cr Jenny Hill Mayor of Townsville

INTRODUCTION / EPHEMERA 2021

Foreword It is a pleasure to be writing a foreword to this momentous occasion; twenty years of Ephemera. When Frances Tomson and the gallery team of 2001 decided to create this opportunity for site-specific, sculptural, performance, environmental and ephemeral art at the newly redeveloped Strand Esplanade, I wonder if they had any idea what an enduring and beloved event it would become.

Ephemera is an important part of our arts calendar, and I know that many artists have it permanently in mind, something to work around every two years, allowing appropriate space to begin thinking through ideas months ahead of the entry date. My own association with it has been, until more recently, a purely vicarious one, with Mum entering something each iteration, one year spurring on the next. Anybody who has been to her house will have seen the lifesavers around the pool area, fibreglass figures, hands above their heads, holding imaginary ropes in the fashion of lifesavers of yesteryear, ala Max Dupain. These silent sentinels of the first Ephemera greet, and sometimes give a startle to, visitors, depending whether it is day or night.

Searching for Harold (also known as ‘the three Brians’ after the model) was a popular EPHEMERA 2021 / INTRODUCTION

work and appeared in some form or another in subsequent iterations of Ephemera.

We had some grand plans for this very special anniversary involving a tour, a kind of ‘best of’ Ephemera, with representation from each biennial iteration, made up of our very talented local artists, but unfortunately it was not to be. The pandemic saw the end of this idea with some serious belt tightening and major programming overhauls, but I do hope that this idea keeps percolating, because it has some legs! Maybe for the 25th anniversary, which would be an ‘off’ year? At any rate, the panel has once again selected some excellent work, and I am certain that you will enjoy it. Particular thanks to the artists. As always, you have given Ephemera your all.

Finally, huge thanks to the galleries team.

Were it not for your enthusiasm, hard work and generosity of spirit, Ephemera simply couldn’t happen.

Onward and upwards!

Jonathan McBurnie Creative Director Townsville City Galleries

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Sponsors Funding Partners

Media Partners

In-Kind Sponsors

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INTRODUCTION / EPHEMERA 2021

Celebrating 20 years

Strand Ephemera 2019 Winners Strand Ephemera 2019 Award for Artistic Excellence judging was completed by a panel of three judges consisting of Alison McDonald, Julian Yonetani and Bradley Vincent. These judges were all under the heat to choose one winner of 28 local, national, and international artists and organisations competing for the major $10,000 Award for Artistic Excellence.

The hotly contended 2019 Award for Artistic Excellence was awarded to Dominique and Samuel Chen for their artwork Dream Palisade. Strand Ephemera Judge, Bradley Vincent said, Dream Palisade was a unanimous choice for the judges, with its commanding presence on the foreshore.

Dominique and Samuel Chen’s, Dream Palisade artwork is an expression of how we can all be fortified by hope considering changing climates and rising sea levels.

The workhouses buried aspirations, forming a barricade against the incoming tide, wind and rain. Their work is reflective of contemporary Australian social and cultural concepts of the environment, connection, and identity.

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“It is a work that, like the best works, reveals more and more layers, the more time you spend with it. We were first struck by its form, the perfect scale and presence for its location and the way it allowed itself to be framed by its surrounds. It invites the viewer down from the foreshore, onto the beach,” Vincent said.

“Finally, we returned at night to find gentle lights embedded in the work, casting an inviting glow. It is a truly deserving and timely winner.”

Voting for the People’s Choice Award came in the form of a Marble Run in 2019 and proved most popular with visitors to Strand Ephemera. In 2019, we saw the total number of votes more than quadruple from previous years with the winner, Hand in the Sand by Karl Meyer.

To add to the creative experience of Strand Ephemera 2019, the Photographic Competition was very popular with the winners being Joshua Wyllie (under 18 years) and Wesley Graffin (18 years and over).

INTRODUCTION / EPHEMERA 2021

Artwork: Dominique and Samuel Chen Dream Palisade Winner Strand Ephemera 2019 Award for Artistic Excellence Photography: Andrew Rankin

Artwork: Karl Meyer Hand in the Sand

Photography: Wesley Graffin Strand Ephemera 2019 Photographic Competition winner 18 and over Depicting City Blocks, Counterpoint Architecture and The Digimen

Photography: Joshua Wyllie

People’s Choice Award winner 2019

Strand Ephemera 2019 Photographic Competition winner under 18

Photography: Andrew Rankin

Depicting Wooden Deity, Daniel Popper

EPHEMERA 2021 / INTRODUCTION

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Ephemera 2021 Overview Ephemera has grown over the years to be loved not only locally, but to be an outdoor seaside sculpture exhibition of state and national significance. For 20 years this exhibition has been called Strand Ephemera, but this year the exhibition received a refresh to Ephemera: Seaside Sculptures. What better year to refresh then in its 20th year marking a milestone in the history of our much loved exhibition.

Staged over 9 amazing days and nights, from 17 to 25 July, this festival will completely transform Townsville’s iconic Strand into a 2km exhibition space.

This year, 20 competitive artworks will be on display, each competing for the major $10,000 Award for Artistic Excellence. The competing artists are a mix of national and local artists presenting unique works using a wide variety of materials and techniques to explore topics ranging from the environment, social issues and celebrating North Queensland’s unique identity. In addition to the competitive artworks, Ephemera will showcase an additional 7 artworks created by invited Australian artists.

The wilson/ryan/grose Lawyers People Choice Award offers visitors the opportunity to have their say on a favourite competitive artwork on display.

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The winning artwork will receive a $1,000 prize. To cast your vote on who will win the wilson/ryan/grose People’s Choice Award head to ephemera-tsv.com.au or scan the QR code on the label at your favourite competitive artwork along the Strand.

You can also enter the public Photography Competition, by capturing their favourite Ephemera 2021 moment or artwork.

Make sure you join in the fun on social media and tag your Ephemera 2021 pictures with the hashtag #ephemera2021.

Ephemera 2021 aligns with the North Australian Festival of Arts (NAFA), and the wonderful Australian Festival of Chamber Music. Countless Northern Fringe Festival events are also on offer around town such as Fringe Ephemera at The Village. For more information on these events, check out the back of this catalogue.

Celebrating 20 years of Sun, Sea and Art. INTRODUCTION / EPHEMERA 2021

Artwork Overview 1

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Major Award for Artistic Excellence

Acquisitional Prize

Sculptural Artworks

Competitive Entries

North Queensland Artists

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2km

Invited Artists

Projection Artists

Townsville City Galleries School Projects

Chalk Artists

of Artistic Escape

EPHEMERA 2021 / ARTWORKS

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Ephemera map 2 1

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KEY 1

Georgina Humphries - Field of Breeze

12 Marcia Bird - Pollut-Ants

2 Ghost Net Collective - The Coral Sea Scrolls

13 Jane Hawkins, Sally Munns, Rhonda Payne Brain Fade

3 Andrea Collisson - Excess

14 Cadaghi Pottery Collective - The Great Chip Scrap

4 Art for ART sake - Reef in grief 5 Robert Guenther - Ragnar V Moby 6 John Nesirky - Standing Wave 1 7

Suzannah Babicci - Figtree Fingers

8 Ryan Catholic College - Replicate Simulate Conserve 9 Brian Robinson - KRAR TUD 10 Bernadette Boscacci - the 3rd wave

15 Sandstorm - WONDER Land 16 Amanda Parer - Intrude 17 Erica Gray - Blue Bottles 18 Zest Events International - Various chalk art along The Strand 19 Lance Seadon - Wave to me!

20 Townsville Primary Schools, Cassie Roberts & Lisa Ashcroft - Ephemera Aquarium

11 Carla Gottgens - I wish you were here

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ARTWORKS / EPHEMERA 2021

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N 21 Christopher Trotter - Foreigner

Competitive Artists

22 Tree & Leaf - Scarewood

Invited Artists

23 Torin Francis - Way

Projection Art

24 Karl Meyer - Sojourn

Canine Cut Out

25 Kirwan State High School Cultural Arts - Morelia - The Story Keeper

Viewing Frames

Wonderland Spiegeltent

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Pink Piano

27 Jan Cleveringa - The Corporate Snake

NAFA Box Office

P1 Yandell Walton - Human Effect

Toilets

26 Five Townsville Secondary Schools with Jo Stacey - Kaleidoscope

P2 Craig Walsh - Monuments

EPHEMERA 2021 / ARTWORKS

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INVITED ARTIST

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Georgina Humphries Field of Breeze Reclaimed: tents, gazebos, sail spinnakers and sun-shelters, stainless steel fixing, carabiners, upholstery cotton, gaffa tape, recycled fabric webbing and rigging 420 x approx. 200-250 cm Price on Application About the Work

About the Artist

Field of Breeze is a kinetic installation that captures the full forces of the Rockpool winds. Emerging from the grassy knoll like a colourful mountain range, these interactive partitions funnel your vision and shift your body as you move in, around and through the installation. Made almost entirely from recycled fabric, this kaleidoscopic horizon is scattered with traces of its former use. Tent windows, air vents and camping logos are subtly embedded in the fabric surface and only reveal themselves to the curious eye of the passing onlooker. The thorny surface will puff out like a sea of stalactites, sharp in appearance but soft to the touch. The fabric landscape will engage visitors as they experience their public space in an unusual and prismatic way; walk around, crawl through, or hide behind the moving sails as the three-dimensional patchwork articulates the wind’s invisible forces.

Georgina Humphries is a public artist living and working in Melbourne. Weaving a wide range of handmade techniques into temporary installations, set design, kids workshops and traditional sculpture.

Humphries creates tangible experiences in an array of public environments. Since completing her Master of Arts (Public Art) at RMIT University in 2011, Humphries’s sculptural works have exhibited in a range public spaces including, Bondi Sculpture by The Sea (2018 & 2019), Gold Coast Commonwealth Games Festival (2018), Queen Victoria Women’s Centre (2019) and most recently the State Library of Victoria (2020).

Whilst this installation strives to capture the public’s attention with its wind-filled stalactites and gelato-colours, underpinning its playfulness is a darker message about the throwaway culture of our times; as we discard and disengage more and more and the veracity of weather events continues to increase.

Over the last 10 years, Humphries’s passion for recycled material has grown alongside a relationship with music and arts festivals. She has continued to collect leftover tents, gazebos and camping gear transforming these ‘waste’ materials into kinetic installations that have been present at festivals both locally, Falls Music & Arts (2012-19) and internationally, Glastonbury (2010).

Georgina Humphries has recieved has received several awards for her art practice, most notably Australia Council funding for New & Innovative Artworks (Bondi Sculpture by the Sea 2019), The Clitheroe Foundation Emerging Artist Mentor Program (Bondi Sculpture by the Sea 2018) and Emerging Artist Award at Lorne Sculpture Biennale 2018.

Image courtesy of the Artist

EPHEMERA 2021 / ARTWORKS

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Ghost Net Collective - Marion Gaemers & Lynnette Griffiths The Coral Sea Scrolls Ghost net and beach rope 250 x 800 x 5 cm Price on Application About the Work

About the Artists

Discarded fishing net, rope and gear is a ghostly silent killer that continues to wash and move with the tidal flow, largely going unnoticed in our sea.

Originally created for fishing using various plastic materials, ghost nets far out-live their purpose. We have created a sea scroll, historically made from papyrus, parchment, or soft metal. We have stitched a modern story returning meaning to the deadly plastic fabric.

Marion Gaemers & Lynnette Griffiths have worked collaboratively since 2010 using marine debris and nets (called ghost gear or ghost nets) creating large-scale installations. Most recently exhibiting together in Umbrella Studio Contemporary Arts, Townsville and Sabbia Gallery, Sydney in 2020.

Previously exhibited in GOMA Brisbane, London, Port Douglas and Cairns (2019) with Erub Arts. They have work on permanent display at the Australian National Maritime Museum in Sydney. Both have works collected by Museo Sa Bassa Blanca, Spain, Le Havre Museum of Natural History, France, Australian National Museum, Australian National Maritime Museum, Musee d’ethnographie de Geneva (MEG) Switzerland, Art Gallery of NSW.

Fish are caught in the nets, birds feed on plastic in the ocean, boats use the ocean, coral is affected by plastic covering the surface and coastal vegetation is strangled by shoreline plastic. People are creating, disposing, and now collecting the plastic. Ours is a visual inscribed language, stitched and layered. It is an evolving story that could be devastating or with human intervention be positive.

Materials were collected from beaches in north Queensland by Tangarora Blue, Australian Navy and us.

Photography: Andrew Rankin Photography

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Andrea Collisson Excess Marine debris; thongs and other plasticised footwear, fishing line and remnant fishing line 300 x 620 x 15 cm About the Work

About the Artist

Excess is a large, freestanding wall of 4300 stacked, plastic footwear, washed ashore in FNQ over the course of a year. I collected 85% of it myself.

Andrea Collisson is an emerging artist from Far North Queensland, with a Bachelor’s degree in Visual Arts through Sydney College of the Arts.

Andrea works almost exclusively with marine debris and has developed a zero waste policy for her practice. Responding to local, regional and global environmental issues, Andrea exhibits her work in The Call of the Running Tide Art Festival in Port Douglas.

Marine debris, thongs especially, are a sign and symptom of over-population. Humans, numbering >7.85 Billion, are so disproportionately numerous that everything we do brings an existential threat to wildlife and causes evermore unspeakable suffering. Annually, one million sea birds and 100,000 marine mammals are killed from marine plastic. On land wild animals die from land clearing, bushfires, smuggling, poaching, hunting, large scale farming, predation from feral and domestic animals, and speeding vehicles. Governments,stuck on population growth to meet social and economic desires justify development and encourage consumption, leading to more waste than we can manage.

My wall is like a billboard calling everyone to take more responsibility for environmental problems.

We are all implicated in the causes, and therefore should apply ourselves to prevention and solutions, however we can.

The Regional Arts Development Fund is a partnership between the Queensland Government and Douglas Shire Council to support local arts and culture in regional Queensland.

Image courtesy of the Artist

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Art for ART sake Reef in grief Recycled Plastics 50 x 300 x 600 cm $1,500 About the Work

About the Artists

Coral reefs are a food source for a myriad of marine species, threatened by rising sea temperatures, micro plastics and waste cast irresponsibly into our oceans. Enter these caves - sit and ponder the messages discovered inside about the challenges facing our reef.

Artists Yanni Van Zijl and Pam Walpole collaborate to combine their two passions - Art and the environment. Their aim is to create a vibrant voice for people in public spaces, making art in public places. Many carry a strong environmental message. They use discarded materials to further enforce the vital message needed to educate the community - to interact with the work appealing to both young and old. They have created site specific work for festivals, but they may also pop up around beaches, national parks and busy streets - often where the viewer least expects it. Sometimes it is there for an hour, a day or a week before it is photographed, documented, and posted on social media.

Image courtesy of the Artist

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Robert Guenther Ragnar V Moby Recycled timber 300 x 240 x 1000 cm $20,000 About the Work

About the Artist

This sculpture has its origin in the ancient Indian Parable of the ‘Three Blind Men and The Elephant’.

Having never been exposed to such a creature, three men arrive at a different part of the animal and create a truth around “what it is”. They do not investigate further or discuss but rather hold firmer to their interpretation, accusing the others of lying. For me, this parable is reflected in today’s world of news and social media. We are often only given a snippet of information, and from this we are creating beliefs. A picture of the prow on Instagram would leave the viewer believing a ship exists.

Alternatively, having the whale tail posted, would leave one to think the skeletal remains of such a creature have washed up. They are both part of the truth, but not the whole truth.

I make beautifully sculptured furniture through my business Woodlust Design. It is usually very curvaceous and flowing but now and then - it is just plain quirky. I thought I had found my niche in woodwork and design. However, during an arts trial in my hometown, I found people referring to my creations as art. It seemed an artist path was calling. So, after spending so long giving function equal billing to form, it was a delight to focus purely on form. This new journey is only in its infancy. At SWELL 2020 on the Gold Coast, I received the Emerging Artist Award.

Image courtesy of the Artist

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John Nesirky Standing Wave 1 Sustainably sourced plywood, recycled foam core, copper sheet and sea glass beads 350 x 800 x 300 cm $18,000 About the Work

About the Artist

2020 has been a world changing year. It has brought rapid and dramatic changes to our lives, and language. Isolation, lockdown, borders, and hotspots now visualised in very specific ways. My concept ‘Standing Wave’ reflects my desire to give future hope, through the visualisation of the power and beauty of waves. To reclaim from daily reported discussions of COVID infection waves and give a sense of optimism through the timeless motion of the sea. The tide comes in, the tide goes out, the sand refreshed untouched for a new day.

John Nesirky is a Townsville-based boatbuilder and sculptor. Nesirky’s sculptures are a result of a lifelong curiosity with form and function; the skeleton of a bird, the strakes of a traditional timber boat, the beautiful fragility disguising a violin’s strength and acoustic intensity. Nesirky was born in London and raised in Oxfordshire, where he studied art and started working with wood. His work reflects his training in boatbuilding and musical instrument construction. He has been working as a Shipwright in Townsville for 24 years. Nesirky has exhibited sculptures at Strand Ephemera and Swell Festival. He has had sculptures selected for placement at Townsville airport, Woodford Folk Festival, and Ignatius Park College. He constructed the Pandora ship replica that has stood as a centerpiece in Townsville Museum of Tropical Queensland for over 20 years.

Photography: Andrew Rankin Photography

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Suzannah Babicci Figtree Fingers Acrylic/wool yarn, reflective tape (polyester, glass beads, phenolic resin, urethane adhesive) steel wire, electrical tape, EL wire, decorative threads (rayon, metallic) waxed cotton thread, twine Various Dimensions $350 per piece About the Work Figtree Fingers are whimsical extensions to existing dangling roots from a large Fig tree. This work emphasises their function to reach the ground, to create additional support and find nutrients. A key feature of these sculptures are the materials for the structures: woven threads on a frame with fine reflective string. The reflective string remains hidden in the network of threads until a brilliant photo-flash capture (i.e. phone camera with flash) - an action drawing out ghostly bright evidence of the structures that would be intact if the tree had been allowed it’s natural growth.

Human interference has caused the roots to be severed, and this work draws on ‘tongue-in-cheek’ references to the hand that would cut and impede, or, possibly heal.

The sculptures also feature an outline with Electroluminescent wire (EL wire) for evening illumination, highlighting the fingers pointing downwards to the earth, calling attention to gravity and to the source of materials for sustenance.

These sculptures draw attention to society’s impact on the environment around us and emphasize the importance for sustainable action.

About the Artist Babicci’s artistic practice is multidisciplinary including video, performance, sculpture, and ceramics. Completing a Bachelor of Visual Arts (Honours) at the Sydney College of the Arts (University of Sydney) in 2013, Babicci’s research and studio work has concerned human interaction with the natural environment and society’s shifting role in the Anthropocene. These works delve into the unseen connections found throughout the natural world, finding synergy in the individual and human collective consciousness. Babicci approaches her work with a keen interest in using materials as a visual language to explore contemporary environmental issues and the world we find around us.

Photography: Andrew Rankin Photography

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Ryan Catholic College Replicate Simulate Conserve Galvanized aluminum armature, found and recycled objects 210 x 450 (3 with 90cm space between) x 4.5 cm $5,000 per panel (6 panels), total $30,000 About the Work

About the Artists

As artists we respond to our environment and contemporary socio/political contexts. Replicate, Simulate, Conserve is a 3 panelled sculpture assembled with recycled materials sourced from our local community. The three panels mimic and replicate a triptych vista of the Strand across to Magnetic Island, on the reverse side a view of Castle Hill above the Strand. QR codes embedded within the artwork connect the audience with local history, culture, geographic and environmental features. This sculpture challenges the viewer to reflect upon our consumer lifestyle prompting a shift to sustainable choices. Replicate, Simulate, Conserve communicates a connection between our consumer lifestyle and our future choices.

We pose the questions ‘Are we willing to accept a simulation of the natural world outside?’ and ‘Will we make a decision to act and conserve the natural environment?’.

As a small diverse group of student artists, the year 12 Visual Arts in Practice students at Ryan Catholic College are determined to make a difference. Guided by their teacher Melissa Ballard, each student has contributed to the strength of our commitment to raise awareness and create change in our consumerist habits.

Characterising the Emmaus story through this creative journey the students have committed their service and led our community to gather resources, organise workshops and make this sculptural artwork. Many of the resources for this sculpture were donated for repurpose by parents, teachers and parish members. Additional materials were purchased from Tangaroa Blue Foundation, an Australia wide not for profit organisation that is dedicated to the removal and prevention of marine debris.

Ephemera is an opportunity for the Ryan Catholic College community to participate in this local iconic art event.

At Ryan Catholic College, we are committed to journey as a community in service to ourselves and each other for a sustainable future.

Photography: Andrew Rankin Photography

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INVITED ARTIST

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Brian Robinson KRAR TUD Plate aluminium 5083 grade, two-pack automotive paint 400 x 200 cm Price on Application About the Work

About the Artist

Krar Tud are Kala Lagaw Ya words from the Western Islands of Torres Strait. They translate into English as turtle shell fish-hooks. Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islanders’ knowledge of the habits of many forms of marine life and their highly developed skills of hunting and fishing ensured them of a ready supply of seafood.

Brian Robinson is recognised as an artist of significant merit, who steps outside existing preconceptions of the role of the Indigenous artist. His work is driven by an innovative and solo career, which also promotes his unique cultural aesthetic. He provides a strong role model with his ability to meld contemporary influences and cultural knowledge, and has developed a dynamic aesthetic that broadens the popular understanding of Indigenous art.

In Torres Strait, fishing from the canoe, shore or around the reefs was done either by the use of fishing lines made from vine, vegetable fibres or coconut fibres with hooks fashioned from turtle shell and sinkers made from stone. In the Western Islands, the bamboo-pronged fishing spear was used for reef spearing.

This work highlights the significance of Townsville’s Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander history, both past and present through the exhibition of this work that is bound to the seascape of the North Queensland region from the Torres Straits southward.

Many stories have been unearthed and provided as stimulus for this work from the artists family, extended kinship, and close friends. This theme was chosen because it references historical and cultural accounts of the local indigenous people’s connection to the environment surrounding them.

Brian is respectful of cultural traditions, observant of protocol and acknowledges local practices.

He has brought awareness of Indigenous culture and heritage to the broader Australian population through his many public art commissions. He is an important leader for artists and Gallery professionals, both Indigenous and nonindigenous, working in his field. Since 1999 he has been extremely active with visual arts development and promotion across the country with appointments to Arts Boards from the Queensland Art Gallery, Australia Council, ATSIC, Umi Arts, TAFE Queensland, Art + Place (Arts Queensland), National Portrait Gallery, CIAF’s Indigenous Reference Panel and recently NorthSite Contemporary Art. In the delivery of public art commissions, Brian and his team have extensive experience in the development and delivery of large, complex public art projects.

Image courtesy of the Artist

EPHEMERA 2021 / ARTWORKS

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Bernadette Boscacci the 3rd wave Recycled tin, plywood, fiberglass, lighting 120 x 450 x 250 cm $9,000 About the Work

About the Artist

This work is inspired by the shallow waters of Cleveland Bay, where the waves meet the land on the Strand. Sometimes, after the rain and when the south-easterly winds blow, the water is choppy and silty brown. The waves undulate in, fold and break, reflecting the sun, city lights and the moon.

Bernadette Boscacci uses a broad range of mediums including sculpture, painting, printmaking, photography, collage and literature.

Her work is predominantly materials based — she produces artworks from found and recycled materials using various techniques and a playful, analogical approach. Recurring themes include nature, ecology, myth, mortality and metaphysics expressions of life in The Anthropocene.

The artist explores her love of water and play using an economy of form in ‘the 3rd wave’. This threepart study (movement, form and substance) like a piece of washed up jetsam, is lying inanimate, yet responsive to its changing environment.

Boscacci studied Sculpture (Fine Arts) at the National Art School, Sydney NSW in the early 1990s, before travelling to work in Community arts and Cultural Development (CCD), and living in the remote north Queensland Aboriginal communities of Kowanyama and Aurukun. Bernadette later gained a Bachelor of Visual Arts and Sociology qualifications (James Cook University) after returning to the east coast of Queensland in 2000. She is based in Townsville and continues to work professionally (and voluntarily) in the arts, CCD, education and environmental conservation and advocacy.

Photography: Andrew Rankin Photography

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Carla Gottgens I wish you were here Digitally printed self-adhesive vinyl, acrylic sheet, steel 100 x 100 x 100 cm each $4,300 About the Work

About the Artist

I wish you were here merges a pixelated computer view with reality. 2020 saw many of us connecting with loved ones and taking virtual journeys to farflung places through our computer screens. The digital view, while sometimes a welcome relief, was never ideal, with the digital view often freezing, breaking up into pixels or completely disappearing.

I wish you were here takes that stereotypical “postcard” scene of palm trees and beach and creates an optical illusion that breaks up the real life visual experience with a digital hiccup.

Gottgens is a multi-disciplinary artist who explores ways to bring photography out of the gallery space and into the physical world with installation and sculptural work. She completed a Bachelor of Fine Arts at the College of Fine Arts in NSW and a Masters of Photography at RMIT in VIC. Her artworks include sculpture, mural art and interactive installations. Carla is regularly commissioned by councils across Australia to create site specific artworks. Her primary inspiration comes from her love of games and puzzles and how visitors can approach and experience her art in a playful and imaginative way. In 2020 despite a COVID lockdown in her state, Gottgens was commissioned for 3 mural artworks, 2 permanent sculptural works and 3 residencies with community organisations.

Her sculptural work has won awards in Swell Sculpture, Sculpture on the Greens in Wyong, NSW, the indoor prize at Lorne Sculpture Triennial, Toorak Village Sculpture Award and Brighton Jetty Classic. She has exhibited at Strand Ephemera five times.

Image courtesy of the Artist

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Marcia Bird Pollut-Ants Plastic waste, found objects, wire 50 x 300 x 300 cm About the Work

About the Artist

This Artwork is constructed of predominately plastic waste, collected from everyday use, wrapped, stitched, and woven over a wire frame. Pollut-Ant is an observation of the emerging effect plastics and microplastics are having on the Earth’s ecology. The Pollut-Ants are seemingly building their nest with plastics being dredged up from the soil, whilst the Ants themselves have become what they consume.

Some of the plastics have been altered and added in, as a symbol of hope that nature will find a way to adapt and survive.

Marcia Bird is a Cairns artist and sculptor. She uses traditional basketry techniques to create both sculptural and functional forms. She is an exhibiting member of the Kuranda Arts Cooperative and a facilitator with the Saltwater Creek Basketry Group.

Bird has exhibited widely including Sculpture Botanica, Cairns, Fringe Ephemera, Townsville, the Tanks Art Centre and Tableland Regional Gallery.

Photography: Andrew Rankin Photography

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Jane Hawkins, Sally Munns, Rhonda Payne Brain Fade PVC pipe, PVC connectors, storm flex drainage pipe, LED lights, cable pliers 300 x 500 x 500 cm About the Work

About the Artists

The work takes a popular form from the Great Barrier Reef, brain coral, and draws a comparison between coral bleaching and the human brain damaged by dementia (a topic close to our hearts as collectively our mothers suffer from this progressive disease). The viewers’ attention is drawn to the changing patterns and colours of light within the form, with the healthy sections in vibrant colour and the rest white, referencing coral bleaching and the depleted memory and cognitive ability associated with dementia.

Jane Hawkins, MCA, Sally Munns, BA(Hons) and Rhonda Payne, BVA(Hons) were born in North Queensland and have spent most of their careers working in the arts/education sector. This team exhibited together in the last two Strand Ephemeras (Highly Commended in 2019), while Jane also exhibited in the first three Strand Ephemeras.

Jane Hawkins is best known for her life-size bronze figures including the Johnathan Thurston statue, although her personal practice includes a diverse range of 3D materials, with a focus on natural forms.

Drawing, painting, photography, digital media, jewellery and ceramics demonstrate the breadth of Sally Munns’ teaching practice. Her own practice includes working with found objects and creating sculptural installations.

Rhonda Payne is a proficient portraitist, with commissions that include Prof. Colin Roderick and Prof. Bill Williams. Her preferred practice is drawing in mixed media on non-traditional supports such as sails, drawing inspiration from local people and places.

Photography: Andrew Rankin Photography

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Cadaghi Pottery Collective The Great Chip Scrap White raku, glaze and steel rod Dimensions Variable From $100 each or $5,000 entire flock About the Work

About the Artists

With a large percentage of Australia’s population living near the coast, seagulls pinching chips is a memory that many of us think of with a smile.

By anthropomorphising these cheeky birds, we encourage you to see yourself, friends and family in the feathery vignettes. From hoarders to courting couples, opportunists and sneaky snackers to those who enjoy a little confrontation, we hope you can identify yourself in the scene.

Cadaghi Pottery Collective is Linda Bates and Michael Pope. We make whimsical and quirky creatures that celebrate life. You will find Cadaghi Pottery somewhere in the middle of insatiable curiosity and imagination, supported by a tonne of clay.

Photography: Andrew Rankin Photography

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Sandstorm WONDER Land Hand sculpted with brickies sand and water Part 1: 270 x 360 cm Part 2: 190 x 480 cm Part 3: 210 x 360 cm About the Work WONDER Land represents the child’s curiosity and struggle to grow up learning to survive in the confusing world of the adult. To understand the adult world Alice learns to overcome the open mindedness of a child and embrace the rules that adults need to apparently live by – most people live by these rules blindly – without asking why – leading to the wacky, crazy, and unexplainable behaviour Alice experiences.

We are asking the viewer to look through the rabbit hole and be taken on a journey into Wonderland with Alice and experience her struggles; while at the same time, reflecting on their own growth.

COVID 19 has us all, adult and child alike struggling to understand, embrace and adapt to a new set of rules we now need to live by to survive in this world – “Where every adventure requires a first step”. The sculpture will provide an opportunity for visual enjoyment, discovery, reflections, interpretation, and interaction with natural materials – sand, sun and water.

By night, coloured lights will flood the sculpture representing the fanciful world of Wonderland.

These lights will cast shadows on the sculpture changing the mood of the sculpture and expressions.

About the Artists Sand Sculptures are our passion and we have been fortunate enough to work for over 350 Australian and International clients. Sandstorm Events is Australia’s only award-winning sand sculpting event management company with 17 years of experience in building and delivering exceptional quality bespoke sand sculptures - located in Melbourne and Australia, owned by husband-and-wife team – Sharon & Peter Redmond. “Not a day goes by that l don’t thank my lucky stars that l can wake up each day and do something that l LOVE. Being able to play a role in living the profile of this amazing ephemeral art form and the artists that create is truly a go that l treasure” - Sharon Redmond.

By day, the sculpture will sit on the sand with the backdrop of the sea and the sun’s rays will illuminate the sculpture enhancing its natural hues and earthy colours.

Image courtesy of the Artist

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Amanda Parer Intrude PVC Tarpaulin, consist of air blowers, led lighting, and production ballast.

Part 1: 700 x 370 x 560 cm Part 2: 310 x 540 x 700 cm Part 3: 340 x 260 x 700 cm Part 4: 500 x 400 x 690 cm Part 5: 700 x 310 x 500 cm About the Work

About the Artist

The original Intrude Classic artwork contains five large rabbits ranging in positions and sizes.

During the day, these large stark white inflatable rabbits look at home in their surroundings and at night they are transformed into stark white illuminated artworks. Rabbits in native Australia are a feral species, they leave a trail of ecological destruction wherever they go and defying attempts at eradication. First introduced by white settlers in 1788, they have caused a great imbalance to the country’s endemic species.

Amanda Parer, Parer Studio’s principal creative and founder is an Australian artist who began her art career as a painter and sculptor in Sydney. Parer now resides in Tasmania, focusing her practice on creating large-scale illuminated art installations and exhibiting around the world.

Yet, the rabbit is also an animal of contradiction.

They represent the fairy-tale animals of our childhood, of furry innocence, frolicking through idyllic fields. Intrude deliberately evokes this cutesy image, and strong visual humour to lure you into the artwork only to reveal the more serious environmental messages in the work. The bunnies of Intrude are huge, the size referencing “the elephant in the room”, the problem, like our mismanagement of the environment, big, but one that we too easily ignore.

The themes in Parer’s work have been inspired by a trip to the Galapagos Islands accompanying her Natural History film makers Aunt and Uncle; Liz Parer-Cook and David Parer in the mid 1990’s. It was there that she experienced animals unaccustomed to humans as any kind of threat.

Having this up-close experience with the unique marine and terrestrial fauna had a large impact on Parer and set the tone for her artwork themes from then on.

Amanda Parer first moved to art installation in 2014 and has so far exhibited in over 100 cities around the globe, enjoyed by millions and they continue to capture public and media attention wherever they go.

Parer Studio is comprised of a team who work internationally to create the artwork and to manage their display #intrude, #parerstudio, #amandaparer.

Image courtesy of the Artist

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Erica Gray Blue Bottles Wire, ducting, plastic, fabric, solar lights Various dimensions About the Work

About the Artist

As a tween I’d run along the shoreline loving the popping sound of the sundried jellies under my heels. For me, it was the sound of summer; the fun times enjoyed with family and friends down at the beach.

Initially influenced by garment design and construction processes, I now utilise similar principles to produce my soft sculpture works.

Pieces that often contain reference to personal experiences, as well as a concern for humanity and our environment. Often anthropomorphic sculptures comprising a blend of synthetic fabrics, artificial lighting or Augmented visual layers, as well as a variety of reflective materials. Gray’s artworks are often layered with meaning, through to pieces designed to play on emotions; works that toy with childhood memories and growing up, holiday adventures, a love of animals as well as the fun times amongst family and friends.

Free app available for iPhone and iPad:

Image courtesy of the Artist

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Zest Events International 3D Chalk Art Various locations along the Strand About the Work

About the Artists

Zest Events International are returning to Ephemera this year and will be bringing along two inspiring and internationally acclaimed street artists to transform the pavement into chalk canvases. A favourite from past Festivals, Rudy Kistler will be returning to share his special brand of fun, interactive chalk art, and Amelia Batchelor will wow the crowds with her mind-bending 3D illusions.

Visitors to Ephemera are encouraged to explore the chalk art trail which will feature artworks that celebrate life in Tropical North Queensland. Have fun in the sun and sand, pose for photos in the chalk illusions and become part of the art!

Amelia Batchelor (aka MealieB) Amelia Batchelor is a painter, sculptor and illustrator with a background in corporate graphic design & multimedia. She creates: murals, 3D street art, runs workshops, commissions, props and sets for movies and more! Amelia has a passion for the environment, expressed throughout her pieces, particularly with the use of eco-friendly materials in her projects and her recycled art sculptures. Vibrant artworks, fun characters and enthusiastic audiences are trademarks of her work.

Rudy Kistler (Dorrigo, NSW) Originally from Chicago USA, Rudy‘s art has taken him through America, Japan and now Australia.

Rudy brings his life experiences to his art; his pavement artworks are wonderfully interactive and live art performances are engaging, whether he be creating complex 3D illusions, murals, or running workshops for budding young artists. Since joining the Zest team, Rudy has taken his brand of 3D art to festivals across Australia like Taste Tasmania, Tamworth Country Music Festival and Parkes Elvis Festival. He regularly works with local government on street art campaigns and he has completed impressive permanent murals across NSW, Japan and the USA.

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Lance Seadon Wave to me!

Bamboo, metal pegs 250 x 800 x 2000 cm $12,000 About the Work

About the Artist

Wave to me! was created as a distraction from the current times we live in. The play of light and shadow of the bamboo waveform allows the observer to rest their mind from the worries of life, rising and falling like the ebb and flow of the ocean.

Just another attempt to express the strength and versatility of bamboo in its natural form!

I have always had an interest in making things from model aeroplanes as a child to highly customised motorcycles in my late teens, which I was involved in for many years.

Waving at you, wave to me!

After leaving Melbourne and buying a farm in NSW in the late 1980’s, I eventually planted bamboo seedlings and watched them grow into towering plants; giant grass in fact, 30 metres high!

Immediately, I saw a great potential as a raw material that has fuelled so many projects over the last couple of decades. I do not think anyone could ever exhaust their ideas about what to do with this amazing natural material, which renews itself every year.

Image courtesy of the Artist

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Townsville Primary School Students with Cassie Roberts and Lisa Ashcroft Ephemera Aquarium Air dry paper clay Various dimensions About the Work

About the Artists

Ephemera Aquarium was a free visual arts project open to all Townsville primary schools, delivered by Townsville City Galleries in collaboration with local artists Cassie Roberts and Lisa Ashcroft. With the knowledge and guidance of our experienced local artists, students learned tactile sculpting techniques and created bright miniature sculptures of reef creatures using paper clay.

Cassie Roberts is a passionate artist working in the fields of art therapy, art education, and her own practice. She is an energetic, inspiring presence in the classroom working to bring out the artistic excellence in every student.

See what marine life you can spot on The Strand in this fun, ephemeral schools project!

Lisa Ashcroft has been a professional artist and tutor for over 30 years. She loves teaching painting techniques and traditional skills through a learning environment in community youth, adult and kids art workshops based on a variety of “swelling environmental topics”.

Image courtesy of Townsville City Council

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Christopher Trotter Foreigner Found objects 400 x 220 x 220 cm $45,000 About the Work

About the Artist

Although this artwork has apparated in my imagination and in various iterations for well over 20 years, the timing of its physical presence is serendipitous to world issues. The artwork is inspired by bio-security threats into Australia including foreign bodies and mutations, as well as invasive life forms such as the Asian Tiger Mosquito and Fire ants. Sustainability references are self-explanatory using recycled materials. The artwork has a night-time presence that is inspired by the flashing boating beacons off the coast of Townsville. The artwork supports my recent ‘Foreign Body’ series as well as my long standing ‘Yellow Period’.

Born in August 1967 - Brisbane Australia. Trotter’s professional art practice began in 1990 exhibiting in galleries along the east coast of Australia.

However, by 1994 he found himself focusing on the creation of multi scaled public artworks. Using his architectural training and knowledge, Trotter has produced works that are innovative and engaging. Not only does he create high impact art pieces, but he also can create intimate discovery works that engage and delight. Since 1994, Trotter has created over 50 public works for government, councils, universities, and developers. Many works have been commissioned as high impact tools for the promotion of sustainability and cultural tourism. In 2001 and 2003, he had solo exhibitions in Tokyo and more recently World Expo - Shanghai 2010 commission, Tokyo Bay 2020/21.

Image courtesy of the Artist

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Tree & Leaf Scarewood Mixed media 240 x 180 x 60 cm About the Work

About the Artists

Foolish humans, you have raised the ire of Scarewood with your incessant noise along my peaceful beach promenade. Awoken from my slumber with the axing of fellow figs and the rustling of your seedlings. What are these scratchings on me? Why must you carve me? That was my best branch! Who is MORRIS 2001? What is this LG that you speak of? Enough! Over the next ten days, heed my warnings.

Tree and Leaf is an artistic duo comprised of Michael Pope and Aaron Ashley. Scarewood marks the first collaboration between two emerging Townsville creatives. Michael Pope is an artist and teacher who works within the Townsville region. Pope predominately works in drawing mediums and sculpture forms. He is the co-founder of Urban Sketchers Townsville.

Aaron Ashley is an interdisciplinary artist blending traditional and audio-visual mediums. Ashley has exhibited in Strand Ephemera in 2011 and 2015 and does work about perspectives, narratives, and social issues.

Projection times: Friday and Saturday during Ephemera 2021: 6:30 – 7:30pm

Image courtesy of the Artist

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Torin Francis Way Stainless steel, aluminium, bearings, concrete, and electronic components 3730 x 800 x 800 cm About the Work

About the Artist

The work Way is a site responsive, kinetic installation that explores the intersections of meteorology technology and spatiotemporal experience. Each sculpture comprises a sail like form that is driven by a programmable motor which slowly pivots and oscillates the frame.

Weather related data is harnessed as a way to explore how atmospheric processes naked to the eye materialise into visual forms. The speed and direction of movement within the work is impacted by a change in temperature, wind direction and humidity. Way encourages a reconsideration of the impact of climate in North Queensland and the role of technology within the discussion of these themes.

Torin Francis is an emerging, Brisbane based artist whose practice considers the devices we use to quantify and navigate the way in which a passing of time is perceived and experienced.

This engagement with these mechanisms is explored through poetic relationships between objects and space in site-responsive installations, kinetic sculptures and moving image work. Francis re-evaluates and re-contextualises weather related objects in both outdoor and indoor spaces.

Francis graduated from the Queensland University of Technology with a Bachelor of Fine Arts, Visual Arts (Honours First Class) and has since been awarded a number of grants and awards, and shown work in both group and solo exhibitions locally and interstate.

Image courtesy of the Artist

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This project is supported by the Queensland Government through Arts Queensland.

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Karl Meyer Sojourn Stainless steel, brass 130 x 120 x 300 cm $24,500 About the Work

About the Artist

The work seeks to explore how vessels are an archetype of human aspiration and imply a desire to journey. Within the visual language of the beached vessel, the form expresses the potential to travel, appearing to be in a duality of being partly finished or in the process of decay. The open and transparent form seeks to interplay with The Strand and immediate coastal environment, using the light and shadow during the day, and internally illuminated at night.

Karl Meyer is a South Australian based artist/ designer with a track-record in creating and developing artworks and sculptures over the past decade. A fascination with the “evolution of ideas, and how they influence people and the physical environment,” led Meyer to study Industrial Design in the early 1990’s.

He has blended his art practice with his proficiency as an industrial designer since 1993 and has a reputation for bringing originality and fascination to his approaches, always encouraging engagement interaction, and a sense of curiosity to the work. He has completed major art commissions in South Australia, Australian Capital Territory and Queensland. Meyer uses the physical form of sculpture as a medium to engage people within the environment, stirring the imagination, and giving them pause to reflect on their surroundings. He is recognised for creating works that are whimsical and thought provoking, bringing originality, and inviting enquiry.

Image courtesy of the Artist

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Kirwan State High School Cultural Arts Morelia - The Story Keeper Wire, steel, ghost nets, cable ties, found materials 60 x 150 x 600 cm – 1100cm stretched $5,000 About the Work

About the Artists

Morelia is a 6m long wire and ghost net sculpture of a local scrub python, slithering around collecting hand-painted story stones. She is a symbol for environmental sustainability and preservation of culture.

The artists are the Cultural Arts students from Kirwan State High School in grades 9 to 12. This project works towards a Certificate II in Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Visual Arts Industry Work.

Students were supported in this collaborative art project by their teachers and mentoring artists.

Morelia’s core structure reflects the importance of a sustainable world. Her skeleton is made up of a combination of rods and wires, as well as abandoned fishing nets gathered from local beaches (known as ghost nets). The use of these ghost nets is symbolic of the need to be using and reusing resources around us, adapting to an everchanging world, as well as being representative of this growing medium for Indigenous Arts.

These mentoring artists include Jane Hawkins, Rhonda Payne, Debra Harber, Kerrie Everett, Bronwen Salton and Kate Holznagel.

In addition, students also invited their peers to join them in painting their own cultural stories on the stones.

Valuing individual stories and perspectives, Morelia collects these real treasures and preserves them in her belly. Together they become a vibrant, undulating ripple of patterns and colours coursing through Morelia’s body as she digests them gaining strength from the many narratives of her community.

Photography: Andrew Rankin Photography

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Annandale Christian College, Heatley Secondary College, Townsville and North Queensland Homeschool Group, Townsville State High School, and Queensland Pathways State College with Jo Stacey Kaleidoscope Mat board, acrylic paint, glue and wire Various dimensions About the Work

About the Artist

The Kaleidoscope project is a creative collaboration between five Townsville secondary school classes, local artist Jo Stacey, and Townsville City Galleries. Channelling themes of urban environmental sustainability, this project seeks to highlight the beauty – in the form of butterflies - of a garden habitat when planted with native flora.

Students learned a range of art techniques and created individual artworks in a series of workshops that culminated in this collaborative and ephemeral artwork. See if you can spot each of the native butterfly species in Kaleidoscope on The Strand!

Jo Stacey is a passionate and talented local artist, who in recent years has been studying an Advanced Diploma of Visual Arts at TAFE, with the focus of her studies being on print making, drawing, painting and artist book making. Stacey’s artworks and workshops always express her love of community, sustainable living, concerns about the environment, and a sense of place.

Image courtesy of Townsville City Council

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Jan Cleveringa The Corporate Snake Fluorescent light globes and clear tape 120 x 170 x 10000 cm variable $20,000 About the Work

About the Artist

The Corporate Snake is a conceptual installation about waste, recycling and sustainability, that reimagines 10,000 working-but-discarded fluorescent light globes worth $75,000.00 of waste. More than an example, it also offers a cerebral, long-term idea about an innovative way to positively recognise and support business as a ‘machine of our culture’ while utilising the incorporation laws to both improve a company and sustainability. The clause supports companies to be unaffected, make more profit, to have control and to contribute towards community innovation.

New global companies may become more efficient, viable and mindful. In simple terms the clause agreement states:

Jan Cleveringa is an award-winning emerging contemporary, experimental, multidisciplinary artist exploring cultural change, sustainability, technology, and their social impacts resulting in painting, installation/sculpture, and video art. Often, he juxtaposes waste in natural environments. Sydney based, he has a Bachelor of Arts (University of Sydney) and studied painting at Sydney College of the Arts (University of Sydney).

New companies agree that if they earn over a billion net dollars then they contribute a percentage back to an independent, monitored, non-for-profit company that they choose. Some companies do this through marketing already.

The idea recognises that the ‘power of the people’ to affect change is when a new company starts.

In 2019 he won the Eden Unearthed Art Prize, Eden Gardens NSW, as well as the 2019 Scenic Sculpture Environment Prize, Scenic World, Blue Mountains NSW. In 2018 he received the Highly Commended Prize in the Adelaide Park Lands Art Prize and for Hidden 2016. He has exhibited paintings in Barcelona, Paris, Berlin, and London. In 2016 he was awarded a grant for new experimental work in painting by the Leo Kelly Blacktown Art Centre Creative Arts Fund.

In addition, he has also been awarded several community and public art project commissions.

Image courtesy of the Artist

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Yandell Human Effect Interactive Projection Installation Various dimensions About the Work

About the Artist

Human Effect employs new technologies to create a responsive public projection installation. Mapping the contours of an urban facade, Walton repurposes it as a canvas for a series of vibrantly animated projections, creating a paradise of verdant growth. Flowering vines twine up pipes, moss and ferns spread across the walls, while vividly coloured butterflies alight on ledges. An echo of ages before human inhabitation, the scene entices viewers to move closer: an approach that sees the new life wither and slowly die, destroyed by the human presence, only to be renewed once more in a riot of foliage and motion as viewers move away. Human Effect was originally created for a Melbourne laneway and exhibited as part of the Melbourne International Arts Festival 2012.

Yandell Walton is a Melbourne-based artist whose work encompasses projection, installation, and interactive digital media. Through work that melds architectural space with the projected image, Yandell has become recognised for her immersive projection works that merge the actual and the virtual to investigate notions of impermanence in relation to environmental, social and political issues.

Yandell grew up in Far North Queensland and has a connection to the unique landscape and rainforest.

Her major solo exhibition Shifting Surround was presented at NorthSite Contemporary in Cairns earlier this year and her research will continue to engage the Wet Tropics throughout 2021.

Daren Toft’s review of Walton’s work found that, “Human Effect reveals how important the fragility of endless cycles and the spectral are to Walton’s practice. Not, though, in the spectral’s otherworldly or post-mortem connotation of uncomfortable return (though the idea of haunting is a tangible theme in her work), but rather more generally in terms of materiality.

She daringly inverts the matrix of touch and growth, interactivity and productivity. As transitory passers-by or determined visitors approach the organic forms manifesting on the walls before them, their touch initiates a process of decline and fall, of degradation.

Yes, you may indeed touch the plants, but at your risk.

Lingham Lane may never be the same again.”

In 2020, she was the recipient of the inaugural Philip Hunter Fellowship, a research project investigating ecological shifts in forests due to human impact. This research continued during the IDEATE program awarded by Australian Network for Art and Technology, allowing her to interrogate technological processes to enable 3D scans of the environment to be animated, introducing humanlike movement.

Image courtesy of the Artist

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Craig Walsh Monuments Projection Installation Various dimensions About the Work

About the Artist

Monuments aims to challenge traditional expectations of public monuments and the selective history represented in our civic spaces.

Cleverly deconstructing its own definition by humanising the monument, there is a temporary fusion of everyday individuals with other living species occupying shared areas. This process undermines the permanent historical and public art models so often controlled by subjective motivations. Monuments recognises the infinite contributions which influence our understanding of place.

Over the last 30 years, Australian artist Craig Walsh has become widely known internationally for his pioneering approaches to site-responsive installations, sculpture, and projection mapping in unconventional sites. His works have animated natural and built environments and features such as, trees, rivers, and mountains, as well as public art projects in urban and architectural space. He is also renowned for his site interventions at live events including iconic works at music and cultural festivals across Australia and internationally.

Walsh’s work remains distinctive for its conceptual underpinnings and deftly woven narrative. Over recent years, he has extended his site responsive expertise into work with diverse communities, enabling large-scale participation as collaborators in contemporary art projects and public art.

Image courtesy of White Night

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Lama’gan © Galleries would like to acknowledge local artist, Jordan Wyles, for his artwork contribution for Ephemera 2021. Jordan Wyles created Lama’gan, which is the Wulgurukaba word for manta ray.

Jordan Wyles’ artwork can be seen throughout this publication and other Ephemera 2021 promotional materials.

About the Artist I have lived in Townsville my whole life and I am a proud Aboriginal artist. I am from the Traditional Owners of Townsville and Magnetic Island, the Wulgurukaba People. The Wulgurukaba people call their country Gurrumbilbarra, Wulgurukaba means “canoe people”. The artworks I create draw heavily from my cultural identity.

I enjoy painting using traditional Aboriginal artwork techniques, some of the techniques include, x-ray technique, cross hatching, herringbone and spray technique.

The colour palette that I generally use is traditional and keeps to colours that would have been used in ancient times such as, ochre, white, yellow and reds. I would define my “style” as traditional and enjoy sharing my artwork and the stories with others. I love painting and drawing on many scales but specialise in creating artworks on canvases.

There is a strong connection to the animals and plants which are native to the local area; animals created within my artwork are often the totems for the local people. It is always considered appropriate and respectful to talk with Traditional Custodians and/or Elders prior to painting artwork to ensure the correct permissions have been obtained. Inspiration for my artwork also comes to me through the traditional or dreaming stories that have been shared through the community over the years. Traditional patterns and designs that I have painted throughout my artwork are patterns and colours that surround us all every day in nature.

Lama’gan © Jordan Wyles 2021

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The Pink Piano It is back again!

Originally included in Strand Ephemera 2009 as an artwork by Jan Hynes, The Pink Piano will be at Ephemera from 17 July until 25 July for public use.

Members of the public are welcome to use The Pink Piano and fill the air with sweet (or jangly!) music. As this is an instrument exposed to the elements, the piano is in ‘honky-tonk’ mode - it’s fun and it’s also the meeting point for individual players or instrument ensembles can meet at The Pink Piano to play for the public.

With Ephemera again coinciding with the Australian Festival of Chamber Music, be sure to keep your eyes and ears peeled because you may be treated to some surprise public performances by one of the world’s best musicians (using one of the world’s most humble instrument).

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STRAND PARK

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SHARE YOUR EPHEMERA EXPERIENCE #EPHEMERA2021 #TOWNSVILLESHINES

Education and Schools Overview vw

Townsville City Council is once again proud to offer schools in the region the opportunity to be involved with Ephemera programs. We have two fantastic Townsville City Galleries schools projects exhibiting in Ephemera this year. There is Ephemera Aquarium, an artwork made by Townsville primary schools and local artists Cassie Roberts and Lisa Ashcroft, and we have Kaleidoscope created by students from Annandale Christian College, Heatley Secondary College, Townsville and North Queensland Homeschool Group, Townsville State High School, and Queensland Pathways State College with local artist Jo Stacey.

17–25 July 2021 vw

ACTIVITY SHEET

Hi, my name is Inspector Clouseau and I’m here to guide you through the Ephemera Activity Sheet!

EPHEMERA AQUARIUM Ephemera Aquarium is an artwork created by Townsville primary school students in collaboration with Townsville City Galleries and local artists Lisa Ashcroft and Cassie Roberts.

Image courtesy of

In this fun and ephemeral schools project, students created a range of paper clay sea creatures to put in our aquarium on The Strand!

Townsville City Council

Visit the Ephemera Aquarium on The Strand and count how many different sea creatures there are.

How many sea creatures do you see?

If you’d like to have a go at making your own sea creature at home, head to the NAFA Box Office and collect a FREE Galleries workshop pack! Packs are only available while stocks last so get in quick!

VIEW ACTIVITY SHEET

Did you know that a group of jellyfish is called a ‘bloom’?

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FOLLOW TOWNSVILLE GALLERIES

There is plenty to be involved with along The Strand too! Take a picture in our Canine Cut Out and Viewing Frames, and be sure to share your pictures with us online! We also have a fun treasure hunt with our mascot Inspector Clouseau for all festival visitors to enjoy.

Educational resources have been developed for self-guided learning adventures along The Strand. We have an Activity Sheet that has been designed for primary school aged students, and an Interactive Sheet that has been created for secondary school aged students. Simply head to our website or click on the images to download each resource to print at home, then bring along when you visit Ephemera!

17–25 July 2021

ET INT ERACTI VE SHE

by far our city’s for 20 years. It is e’s cultural identity international artists. a part of Townsvill local, national, and Ephemera has been hosted countless far and wide, to celebrate arts event, and has the community from most visited visual festival brings together style. nd This seaside sculpture a go - tropical North Queensla age students, so have sun, sand, and art for secondary school designed lly a! is specifica way through Ephemer This Interactive Sheet as you make your at some of the questions

I WISH YOU WER

E HERE

wish you were Carla Gottgens, I printed here [detail], digitally acrylic sheet, self-adhesive vinyl, 100 cm each steel, 100 x 100 x the artist.

Image courtesy of

I wish you were here, Carla Gottgens’ artwork, reality. computer view with of us merges a pixelated 19 has seen many The impacts of COVID loved ones through our g with staying connectin computer screens.

calls, often broken video Inspired by these wanting to Carla Gottgens is what do you think with this artwork? convey to the viewer

, artists have artwork for Ephemera When creating an artwork and they will install their The to think about how as environmental impact. consider things such same state be returned to the environment should without any prior to Ephemera, that it was found in or waste left behind. destruction, damage taken would Carla have ?

What considerations proposal her g developin into account when

VIEW INTERACTIVE SHEET

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GET INVOLVED / EPHEMERA 2021

Inspector Clouseau’s Treasure Hunt Have some fun with Inspector Clousea’s Treasure Hunt along The Strand!

Ephemera’s friendly manta ray, Inspector Clouseau, has left behind a trail of clues at some of the artworks along The Strand.

Answer each clue to discover his treasure!

Ask for a map at the NAFA Box Office or download a copy HERE . Then use the map to help guide the way! Don’t forget to write down your answers as you go.

Once you’ve answered the mischievous manta ray’s five clues, head to the NAFA Box Office in Strand Park and show the staff member your answers to unlock Inspector Clouseau’s treasure chest and receive a reward!* *Inspector Clouseau’s Treasure Hunt reward is only available while stocks last, so get in quick!

DID YOU KNOW? Our Ephemera mascot, Inspector Clouseau, is inspired by a pink manta ray that was discovered on the Great Barrier Reef!?

Manta rays can be seen all along the East Coast of Australia, and whilst some oceanic manta rays can grow as big as 7 metres in wingspan, they really are gentle giants! They are completely harmless to humans, happily eating a diet of plankton, small fish and crustaceans.

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wilson/ryan/grose Lawyers People’s Choice Award Love Ephemera? Want to make sure your favourite competitive artwork is recognised?

Cast your vote here:

You can cast your vote online! By voting for your favourite artwork you will go in the running to win one of five $100 vouchers.* The most popular artwork, as judged by Ephemera visitors, will receive the wilson/ ryan/grose Lawyers People’s Choice Award of $1,000.

Voting closes 11:59pm Friday, 23 July 2021.

The winner of the wilson/ryan/grose Lawyers People’s Choice Award will be announced on social media.

*For full T&Cs please visit our website ephemera-tsv.com.au

GET INVOLVED / EPHEMERA 2021

Photography Competition Capture your favourite moments at Ephemera 2021 for the chance to win some fantastic prizes!

Categories are: Ephemera Youth Winner (17 years and under) $500 Garricks Camera House Voucher

About the Judge: Rob Parsons, Through the Looking Glass Studio

Ephemera Youth Runner Up (17 years and under) $250 Garricks Camera House Voucher Ephemera Open Winner (18 years and older) $1000 Garricks Camera House Voucher Ephemera Open Runner Up (18 years and older) $250 Garricks Camera House Voucher To enter, simply upload your photograph from Ephemera to Instagram and add the hashtag for the category you are wanting to enter: #ephemerayouth (17 years and under) or #ephemeraopen (18 years and over).

If your instagram account is private, use the competition link below to upload your photograph.

Through The Looking Glass Studio is a multi-faceted imaging studio with over 25 years of experience providing professional imaging services to a broad cross-section of businesses throughout Australia.

Through The Looking Glass Studio specialises in commercial photography, corporate photography, and portraiture.

Rob Parsons is a professional photographer based in Townsville with Through The Looking Glass Studio.

Entries close 11:59pm Sunday, 1 August 2021.

Winners announced on social media on Wednesday, 4 August 2021.

ENTER NOW *For full T&Cs please visit our website

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TICKETS NOW ON SALE! N A FA-TSV. C O M . AU

disrupt your perception 30 JUL — 08 AUG punq.org.au Pop Up North Queensland (PUNQ) is Umbrella Studio Contemporary Arts’ premiere festival which showcases the most exciting visual and performance art by North Queensland and Australian artists and arts organisations. Explore exhibitions, site-specific installations, performances and workshops in galleries, pop-up art spaces and distinct North Queensland landscapes.

Celebrating

Years of PTRG

Robert Preston / Inner Visions: Observation, Abstraction and Imagination, 1955 - 2021

A Journey Through Images: 40 Years of Perc Tucker Regional Gallery

Perc Tucker Regional Gallery 18 Jun – 22 Aug 2021

Perc Tucker Regional Gallery 3 Sep – 28 Nov 2021

Image: Robert Preston, Morning Raga on Contemplating Pataya [detail], 1978, gouache on Arches Dessin paper, 36 x 33cm. Collection of City of Townsville.

Image: William Bustard, Castle Hill, Townsville [detail], 1936, watercolour on paper, 31 x 41.5cm. Collection of the City of Townsville, purchased 1995.

Perc Tucker Regional Gallery Cnr Denham and Flinders St Townsville QLD 4810 Tuesday - Friday: 10am - 3pm Saturday: 10am - 1pm

(07) 4727 9011 galleries@townsville.qld.gov.au whatson.townsville.qld.gov.au Townsville City Galleries TownsvilleCityGalleries

Fresh Material: New Australian Textile Art Perc Tucker Regional Gallery 3 Dec 2021 – 30 Jan 2022 Image: Leah Emery, These Are My Real Eyes Now [detail], 2020, embroidery thread on aida cloth, 30 x 50cm. Courtesy of the artist.

Graphic Tendencies: Works from the City of Townsville Art Collection Pinnacles Gallery 30 Apr - 8 Aug 2021 Image: Ian Smith, The Meaning Beyond the Sign – The Truth Behind the Ad [detail], 2002, Oil and synthetic polymer paint on canvas, 107 x 144cm. Purchased from Heiser Gallery, 2011. City of Townsville Art Collection. Image courtesy of the Artist.

Pinnacles Gallery 20 Village Boulevard Thuringowa Central QLD 4817 Tuesday - Friday: 10am - 3pm Saturday: 10am - 1pm

In Cahoots: Artists collaborate across Country, presented by Fremantle Arts Centre Pinnacles Gallery 20 Aug - 22 Oct 2021 Image: Tony Albert, Kieran Lawson and David C Collins, Warakurna Superhero #1 [detail], 2017, C-type print, 100 x 150 cm. Image courtesy of the artists, Sullivan & Strumpf and Warakurna Artists.

(07) 4773 8871 galleries@townsville.qld.gov.au whatson.townsville.qld.gov.au Townsville City Galleries TownsvilleCityGalleries

TAFE 2021 Exhibition Pinnacles Gallery 29 Oct - 19 Nov 2021 Image: Stephen Terry, Arcology [detail], 2020, Acrylic paint on board, 60 x 90 cm. From MAKE, an exhibition of TAFE students 2020.

Arryn Snowball: Slack Water Pinnacles Gallery 24 Nov - 4 Feb 2021 Image: Arryn Snowball, Deep above [detail], 2020 tempera on linen 190 x 190cm.

For more information on any future exhibitions, visit: whatson.townsville.qld.gov.au

Galleries Perc Tucker Regional Gallery Perc Tucker Regional Gallery is Townsville's premier regional art gallery, offering a dynamic range of local, national and international exhibitions complemented by workshops, talks and a host of other programs.

Perc Tucker Regional Gallery Cnr Denham and Flinders St, Townsville QLD 4810 Tue - Fri: 10am - 5pm Sat - Sun: 10am - 1pm

(07) 4727 9011 ptrg@townsville.qld.gov.au whatson.townsville.qld.gov.au Townsville City Galleries

Pinnacles Gallery Pinnacles Gallery is a dynamic art space committed to community engagement, artistic development, and contemporary practice.

Pinnacles Gallery Riverway Arts Centre 20 Village Blvd, Thuringowa Central QLD 4817 Closed Mondays Tue - Fri: 10am - 5pm Sat: 10am - 1pm

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(07) 4773 8871 pinnacles@townsville.qld.gov.au whatson.townsville.qld.gov.au Townsville City Galleries

EPHEMERA 2021

Organised by Judith Jensen Team Manager Arts (Visual and Performing) Jonathan McBurnie Creative Director Rachel Cunningham Senior Education and Programs Officer Erwin Cruz Senior Exhibitions Officer Tanya Tanner Senior Public Art Officer Jo Lankester Collections Management Officer Chloe Lindo Curatorial Assistant Jonathan Brown Education and Programs Officer Leonardo Valero Exhibitions Officer Ashleigh Peters Education and Programs Assistant Michael Favot Exhibitions Assistant Caitlin Dobson Public Art Officer Wendy Bainbridge Gallery Assistant Sascha Millard Gallery Assistant Veerle Janssens Gallery Assistant Rabin Sherchan Gallery Assistant Kate Burke Gallery Assistant Holly Sherman Business Trainee Published on Publisher Galleries Galleries, Townsville City Council PO Box 1268 Townsville Queensland, 4810 Australia ptrg@townsville.qld.gov.au ©Galleries Services, Townsville City Council, and the Authors 2017 ISBN: 978-0-949461-49-0 EPHEMERA 2021

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