Strange Fruit

My tapestries are usually observations of life around me, sometimes serious, sometimes not…

A couple of years ago in late spring I planted some heritage tomato seedlings, and other tomatoes spouted from the compost. These plants produced a crop of tomatoes that amazed me with their variety of colour and shape. When ripe I placed them on a blue plate with a few home-grown chillies. I found myself taking numerous photos of them, my fingers were itching, so the next obvious step was to weave them. This I started me on a series of works based on my vegetable garden, and the idea kept growing…

With some encouragement from Neon Parlour this exhibition has expanded from just the veggie patch into a bigger backyard complete with a shed space and swimming pool area, each theme having its own room.

The ‘Shed’ series came about after helping my parents downsize their possessions prior to moving to a retirement village. I desired my father’s Sidchrome toolset, when I stated this I was informed that my elder brother would be getting it. After being a bit discouraged by this fact, I decided that I could weave my own. I realised that I liked the neatness, organisation of the tools and the nice red of the metal box, whereas my brother would use the tools then in time hand the set down to one of his sons. After a while I also started to look into my partners shed…

The beautiful blues of swimming pools have always been attracted me with a variety of colours, shades, reflections and water patterns. The ‘Pool Hose’ series was the result of observing that every time I walked past the pool in a Fremantle backyard the hose was making a different but equally interesting pattern that reminded me of calligraphy strokes. The 4 long tapestries with word and numbers in the side border are a reflection of observing swimming pools in the Northern Territory, they must have all been made to a building code as they had the same fencing, tile and brick edging, but with a variation of colour. (The numbers and script relate to the date, the location and the temperature.)