Silkscreen print

Last year I had the renewed joy and pleasure walking through forests under a canopy of trees, along foot tracks around and over rocks. This is called shinrin-yoku in Japanese, forest bathing, a physiological and psychological exercise for wellbeing. Unlike monoculture forests in other countries, Australian forests have a diversity with multispecies of trees, depending on the soil and aspect. The trees are identified often by the leaves on the path.

I was walking the Great North Walk, from Sydney towards Newcastle, and was aware that others had walked these paths before for generations. My prints are inspired by the Forest Portrait drawings of Marion Mahony Griffin from 1919; and by a silk screen poster of Marie McMahon, You are On Aboriginal Land 1984.

Read more on the blog.

RED//RED BLUE//BLUE//BLUE//RED 2021 A site responsive wall construction in 100 and 150 mm PVC strips and nails, 240cm high x 750cm long, and 15 unique lino prints on 300gsm Somerset Satin White paper. Influenced by the Bauhaus weaver Anni Albers, I wove vertical and horizontal strips in the process of lino printing, with the resulting prints resembling Japanese calligraphy. In 2020, a shifted developed from my strictly red and black palette to include more colours and exclude black. The titles of the work changed to songs being streamed in the studio on Spotify, and more recently to those from lines of the colour poems by the American Robert Lax (1915-2000). Lax is known for his meditative and condensed vertical poems. Over the years his poetry became increasingly minimalist until some of his works used only single syllables: red red blue blue blue red yel low yel low red blue Lax used the repetition of words/colour, one word at a time, in a similar way to my process of lino printing, one colour a day. Lax’s poems are to be read aloud to hear the sound and rhythm he intended. My prints have a clickety-clack, as strips of colour overlap like a two-dimensional construction of a child’s building blocks. Lisa Pang has described these new installations as “colour percussion.” I develop studies for the site-specific wall installations through lino printing. The multiple sheet prints are enlarged and transformed through scale and the materiality of the PVC.

Solo exhibition Factory 49, Marrickville, March 2021

Photo credit Carlos Velasquez

100x150 PVC strips nailed around the four walls of Backroom of Articulate Project Space

This site responsive wall construction is influenced by the colour poems of Robert Lax, in particular his "Homage to Reinhardt" black/black/black// blue/blue/blue// black/black/black/black// blue/blue/blue[17]

Articulate Project Space, Leichhardt January 2021 Photo credit- Carlos Velasquez

lino print transferred photographically to aluminium, 76x56cm

Accompanied by music, the series Riff in Prussian Blue developed at the printing press, where colour interaction and musical associations produce syncopated visual rhythms around a central motif.

Selected Finalist for Open Category Fishers Ghost Art Prize 2020 Campbelltown Art Centre.

Lino prints, inherited traymobile 70 (h) x 45 x 65cm

Blue and Yellow was the initial colour shift for Ro from her signature Red and Black, conceived during the pandemic lockdown. Blue and yellow with making green, are her clan colours of the McKenzie tartan. The Lino print placemats presented on the tray-mobile were an application for Meroogal Women’s Art Prize, 2021. The 1886 heritage house Meroogal, Nowra, was designed and built by Kenneth McKenzie for his sister Jessie Thorburn and her four unmarried daughters.

The prints were exhibited on two sides of a plinth for the Factory 49 2020 Annual Group Show

Photo credit - The Guthrie Group

REDYELLOWBLUE 2020 240x600cm, PVC strips on marine ply

Project Ugly Billboard, carpark LOOKprint Albion Street Leichhardt

Photo credit - The Guthrie Group

HEARTBEATS (Jose Gonzales) 2020 Lino prints series on Somerset 300gsm

This series of 10 works developed over COVID19 explored music and colour, through weaving vertical and horizontal strips. This HEARTBEATS series followed my RIFF IN PRUSSIAN BLUE series, which took a departure from my signature palette of red and black, colours of protest. Colours of nurturing, healing and renewal emerged, blue and yellow replaced black, pale blue and pink played off against red.

Exhibited in XROADS Group Exhibition at Chrissie Cotter Gallery, August 2020.

Two wall weavings in 100mm PVC strips and nails, 205 cm high, and five unique lino prints on 300gsm Somerset Satin White

Every Time the Sun Comes Up marks a major palette shift by Ro Murray, a departure from her signature red and black series. Conceptualized as a musical response, printed linear marks of varying opacity and translucence are presented alongside translations into wall weavings made specifically for the gallery space.

Every Time the Sun Comes Up is the wistful song playing in the background while artist Ro Murray works alone and to a new rhythm in her studio. For many, this recent lockdown has been a time defined by isolation and yearning. The chorus every time the sun comes up, I’m in trouble references repetition, physical cycles and what it is to feel blue, yet it is tinted with warmth and suggests renewal. MORE essay by Lisa Pang BLOG

AIRspace Projects, Marrickville, July 2020

Photo credit - The Guthrie Group

Four wall weavings in 100mm PVC strips, each 120x80cm

RedRed BlackBlack BlackBlack Blue is an installation named after a poem. Abstract Poem, written by Robert Lax (1967) is itself a response to the paintings of Ad Reinhardt. On a white page, the poem appears as a slightly unstable vertical tower of words. With more white space than black text, much more is unsaid than said. It is a poem to be seen. Read aloud, as it will be to accompany the exhibition, it evokes the sensations of colour; of rolling reds held against and between the clipped drips of black and of blue, spoken colour as visualisation, pattern and syllabic syncopation. Three colour-words, four columns, and an internal variation form the rhythmic structure.

The parallels between Murray’s work and Lax’s poetry are apparent; not only as a material, visual echo of language, but also in the clear intent to work reductively. In common there is a distillation of communication by using the simplest elements and weighing the spaces between them. Whether single colours or single words, they are presented with measure, equality and economy.

Lax has been described as a Concrete poet, yet also as an Abstract Minimalist. Murray’s previous geometric works were eloquent with the language of protest. Eschewing the lyrical and the expressive in favour of the blunt reality of colour, line and plane, paradoxically, creates an opening, the space that Murray will work in to create this installation. She describes it as a way of working within strict parameters, through a process that is open to chance. Are Lax’s words sufficient to convey the myriad nuances of a visual art – involving scale, character of edges, straightness of line, texture of material and adaptations to the vagaries of site? These are the details that betray human interaction and continue Reinhardt’s discourse on the divide between art and life.

Lisa Sharp, December 2019

Gallery4, Five Walls Footscray Melbourne, February 22 – March 9, 2020

recycled PVC strips, diptych 240x335cm

After 100 days of unprecedented fires in NSW, can we deny climate change and its effect on our environment and consequently our lives. #fuelled continues in my language of protest in red and black. The two wall weavings resembling Japanese calligraphic marks, are scaled up from lino prints inspired by the lecture on Ani Albers by Lynne Cook.

Installation at SLOT Redfern, 24/7 street viewing over January 2020

CROSSHAIRS 2019 - lino print series, 76x56cm each

FIVE BY FIVE 2019 - wall weaving in PVC strips, 150x180cm

“This pairing of Factory 49’s two exhibition spaces enables artist Ro Murray to speak expansively from a reductive visual vocabulary made up of of dualities and the spaces between them. Returning to a signature colour palette of black and red on white, with rectilinearity reduced to horizontal and vertical placements, the distinct processes of printmaking and weaving interact unexpectedly as an anchor of human scale in site-specific installations.

Perhaps, and as Lynne Cooke describes of Anni Albers, this means, of prioritizing the experiential over the didactic provides non-objective art with a way in which protest can meet pictorial abstraction, technology and architecture.” Read more - Lisa Sharp October 2019

SOLO exhibition 6-16 November 2019 Factory 49 Marrickville

PVC strips, acrylic painted plywood, 2019 installation Office Project Space Factory49 coinciding with solo exhibition Black Vertical and Red Horizontal in the Main Gallery.

Photographer - Ben Gutherie

“In this pairing of Factory 49’s exhibition spaces, Ro Murray returns to the distinctive colour combinations of black and red on white to create new work, informed by printing and weaving techniques. Murray presents linear installations that play upon the grid, human scale, perspective and architectural space as a way of confronting and reflecting upon the place and role of humans in shaping the future of the world.” Lisa Sharp

Acrylic wall mural and assemblage in timber

240 x260x 360cm

Exhibited Office Space Factory49

acrylic on marine ply, 240x480x 120cm

#adani continues my recent abstract geometric series in black and red, hash- tagging coal fired power stations. Starting with #liddell with the controversy over Federal Government pushing AGL, the owners, to keep the power station to remain open despite it being inefficient. The series developed with the murals #yallourn, #hazelwood. The hashtag symbol is a handle used by social media. The Adani owned Carmichael coal mine in Queensland, has proposed to build a shipping lane through the already threatened Barrier Reef. Despite the banks refusing to lend money to Adani from public environmental pressure, the Federal and Queensland Governments, have stepped up to with money. The 2015 Paris Agreement is a global goal to keep temperature increase below 2 degrees and reduce greenhouse emissions. Coal as a dirty fuel, whether used for power in Australia or India, has a detrimental effect on Climate Change. It makes you wander about lobbying and invested interests of both political parties that they can be in such denial about sustainable energy, rising sea temperatures and sea level.

Exhibited Finalist North Sydney Art prize 2019

Acrylic wall mural, 350x250cm
Exhibited Outside Wall Factory 49

Lino print on pianola roll, 240x30cm
Group Exhibition Fill in the Gap, Factory 49

Acylic on plywood, size variable

Exhibited Annual Group Show, Factory 49

Acrylic on plywood, 240x350cm

Solo Exhibition A-four to A-zero, Factory 49

Acrylic on plywood, 240x450cm
Group Exhibition Fill in the Gap, Factory 49

Lino print on 300gsm hahnemuhle paper, 107x78cm

A-four to A-zero was an exploration through lino printing of the material intersections between colour, form and paper, referencing the geometry of A-series rectilinear shapes. The elusive translucency of architectural negatives forms the ground for overprinting in geometric shapes derived from an A4 lino block. These compositions in red and black form an ongoing investigation into spatial relationships.

The exhibition included works on the floor and wall.

SOLO EXHBITION at Factory 49, 2018

Dye sublimation prints on aluminium, 84x59cm

The original lino prints on my dead filed A1 size architectural negatives are on tracing paper, hand drawn with ink.

Solo Exhibition A-four to A-zero, Factory 49

Lino print, ink on tracing paper, 84x60cm 

This series of prints on my “dead filed” architectural plans are both a reconnection and a rejection of my previous life. These negatives on tracing paper were hand drawn with ink, before computer drafting programs, precious and carefully protected for printing onto paper. The A1 sheets of house plans have been printed over, often on the back with the writing in reverse or obscured, no longer significant or relevant. The architecture has taken on another life.

Group exhibition Inhabited Architecture Chrissie Cotter Gallery Camperdown

Acrylic on marine plywood, 240x600cm, public billboard part of Project Ugly on Albion Lane Leichhardt, LOOK PRINT carpark.

Acrylic marker  on acrylic  180x360cm

Solo exhibition COVES CLIFFS AND CREEKS Willoughby Council Foyer 2017

Group Exhibition A LITTLE DEATH Chrissie Cotter Gallery 2018

Collage paper and ink on tracing paper, 56x126cm

Dye sublimation print on aluminium, 56x42cm

My work on middens developed from research for the commissioned exhibition for Willoughby Council ”Coves, Cliffs and Creeks” 2017, with exploration by foot and water of the remnant bushland on the western side of Middle Harbour. Sitting on a large rock looking north east up the harbour, I look down below to see oysters on the rocks. Climbing down to the water, I discovered oyster middens either side of a large rock shelter.

This series of work on my dead filed architectural negatives started with a Masterclass with Ruth Hadlow in 2017. Channelling two of my favourite artists Rosalie Gascoigne and Henri Matisse, I produced initial works with torn black tissue paper, collage in ordered rows.

Finalist Marie Ellis Prize for Drawing 2018

Ceramic, 50x150x150cm

Solo exhibition COVES CLIFFS AND CREEKS Willoughby Council Foyer 2017

Group Exhibition A LITTLE DEATH Chrissie Cotter Gallery 2018

Collage and ink, dimensions 60x84cm

Or death to the plastic drinking bottle, a homage to the thousands of plastic water bottles that go to landfill or are dumped in the ocean, on one of my dead filed architectural drawings from a past life.

Finalist Greenway Art Prize 2017
Finalist Swan Hill Print and Drawing Prize
Wyndham Art Prize

Ink, gouache and conte on unique lithograph prints, 56x76cm.     

These works are part of series with “Girl in the Bark Hat” drawn over unique lithographic prints with the text (mirror reverse) “How do you say I care in Icelandic mer er ekki sama.”

The boy is my brother.

Group Exhibition “Another perspective with Paper” Grace Cossington Smith Gallery, 2017

Ink and acrylic on rag paper, steel, ceramic, timber, plastic, markers on acrylic.

This project investigates remaining remnant bushland of the western side of Middle Harbour, imagining a time before twentieth century development.

I explored the area on foot and on the water. Different views, from above on the rocky headlands jagged patches of water glimpsed distantly through branches of trees. Then down on the water, enclosed by fallen rock boulders retained by looming hills of trees or tidal mangroves forests along the creeks; remnants of indigenous rock shelters, middens and fish traps; and plastic bottles.

Commissioned by Willoughby City Council for their Foyer for Willoughby Visual Arts Biennial 2017 

Photographer - Oliver Ford

Acrylic on glass, life size. 

This Arterie project follows Ro’s Artist in Residence with Arterie@RPA Hospital in 2016, where she drew on glass with acrylic markers, profiling people across the hospital, identified by their first name and postcode, hence the title PROFILE2050.

At Chris O’Brien Lifehouse over the 3-week residency, 45 portraits were painted on the glass walls around the hospital. 

Identifying the community who “make up” Chris O’Brien Lifehouse - family and friends, patients, volunteers, medical, administrative and support staff.

Each “portrait” is a life-size silhouette painted onto the glass walls around the hospital. Each person is identified by the initial of their first name and the year they were born.

Acrylic on plywood, 155x140cm

There are a few places you think children shouldn’t be, like warzone areas and detention centres. And this year we see realism footage in world and local news. The BBC from Aleppo in Syria showed five-year- old Rawan Alowsh being pulled alive from the rubble by her pony tail. And mistreatment of indigenous youths captured on CCT cameras in Northern Territory Don Dale Detention Centre being stripped naked, tear gassed, and put into solitary confinement. And undercover interviews of refugees and asylum seekers in indefinite detention on Nauru, and absenteeism of the children from school because of bullying.

I wouldn’t want this for my grandchildren.

Selected Finalist North Sydney Art Prize 2017

ARAUCARIA EXPLORII, 2017

Oil on ply, timber. 220x46x70

This sculpture started with the profile of Yuri Bolotin, the co-director of Bilpin international ground for Creative initiatives (BigCi), during my artist residency November 2015. Yuri is exploring, naming and recording the wilderness area in The Gardens of Stones.

The work has been developed for the curatorial theme for Harbour Sculpture at Hunters Hill, with its sandstone houses and introduced Bunyan pines. The aboriginal name, of the Wallumategal people, for the area is Moocooboolah, meaning “two waters”, was unsuccessfully proposed by Joules Joubert in 1865.

Finalist- Harbour Sculpture 2017

Commissioned by aMBUSH Gallery for Art for the Planet Darling Quarter 2017

Oil on ply, 175x155cm

This piece is a silhouette of Vanessa Macedo who won the Environment Prize at BigCi in Bilpin, 2015. Vanessa is a documentary film maker and was artist-in-residence at BigCi when I was there November 2016 during my residency. Vanessa was making a video about a group of explorers and went with them on several exhausting and strenuous walks in The Garden of Stones National Park adjoining Wollemi National Park. The Garden of Stones is a World Heritage Wilderness Area with unique ironstone ravines and pagodas. It is being threatened by long wall coal mining.

Included in group exhibitions: -
RENEW Chris O’Brien Lifehouse 2016
What Next Articulate Project Space 2016
Selected for Home Grown: The Urban Landscape Willoughby Visual Arts Biennial 2017

Acrylic on plywood, 155x140cm

There are a few places you think children shouldn’t be, like warzone areas and detention centres. And this year we see realism footage in world and local news. The BBC from Aleppo in Syria showed five-year- old Rawan Alowsh being pulled alive from the rubble by her pony tail. And mistreatment of indigenous youths captured on CCT cameras in Northern Territory Don Dale Detention Centre being stripped naked, tear gassed, and put into solitary confinement. And undercover interviews of refugees and asylum seekers in indefinite detention on Nauru, and absenteeism of the children from school because of bullying.

I wouldn’t want this for my grandchildren.

Finalist – North Sydney Art Prize 2017 (installation of 8 figures)
Selected Blacktown Art Prize 2016

Conte, ink, on paper. 75x56cm

The drawings are over three unique lithograph prints with the text “How do you say I care in Icelandic mer er ekki sama.”

Private collection (Girl in the Bark Hat III)

Selected finalist Blacktown Art Prize (Girl in the Bark Hat I)

Life-size, acrylic marker on glass, paper

Profile 2050 was a live interactive performance designed to engage the RPA community. Participants resided Eastlake, Lakemba, Breakfast Point, Leichhardt, Dulwich Hill, Vaucluse, Stanmore, Camperdown, Enmore ,Tamworth, Campsie, Roseberry, Rosebay, Nyngan, Lilyfield, Marrickville, Clovelly, Beverly Hills, Casula, Coffs harbour, Balmain, Forest lodge, Lidcombe, Bathurst, Marrickville, South Croydon, Newtown, Turrella, Berrilee, Cabramatta, Haarlem, Hurlstone Park, Bexley North, Lewisham, Ashfield, Wolli Creek, Belfield, Glebe, Chipping Norton, Annandale, Kingsgrove, Asberry, Haberfield, Neutral Bay, Rosebay, Burwood, Russel lea, Roselle, Petersham, Warren, Engadine. The drawings on glass were made from paper patterns of the participants.

Profile 2050 was a six week project undertaken as Artist in Residence with Arterie at Royal Prince Alfred Hospital Camperdown, February March 2016.

Found fishing (shark) net, sinkers, floats; recycled plastic bottles and pieces; stainless steel cable and turnbuckles, garden hose, gaffa tape. size variable

High Tide is a visual statement referencing waste in our waterways. It is to look like a king-tide has swept through the trees leaving brightly coloured marine debris. Historically local fishing boats would catch prawns on the Parramatta River; this same water way is no longer a safe food source due to the heavy metal levels from industrial waste. On a bigger scale waste is affecting marine life - fish are consuming harmful plastic and ghost nets are entangling and endangering turtles and marine mammals.

Commissioned by Leichhardt Council for Art on the GreenWay, Canal Road Hub Environmental Art 2016

Recycled plastic containers and garden irrigation piping, cable ties, steel

This work is an alert to how much plastic we use to package and transport our food and how it effects the survival of wild life. About half is recycled and the rest is landfill or dumped in the ocean. Most plastic is non-biodegradable.

Selected finalist

Sculpture on the Greens, Wyong 2016

Sculptures at Sawmillers, McMahons Point 2016  

Gouache, ink on paper 100x110cm

Rachael Jacobs asked Muslim women to replace her hijab- “I’ll ride with you”, she posed on social media, for those who felt intimated by anti-Islamic sentiment.

The drawing is from my sketch at the Qing dynastyexhibition “The Golden Age of China” exhibition at NGV 2015

Marker on poster bill posters, 155x121cm

WALK maps an urban path, a regular routine journey walking from home to school. This is the corner with the traffic lights. It is typified by commercial shops and vehicles; wallpapered with advertising and bill posters.

Won Highly Commended –Blacktown City Art Prize, 2015

Private collection

Mixed media on paper, galvanised iron, charcoal 180(h)x 260(w)x 200(d)

BLACK is a series of drawings from my 4 week residency at Big Ci Bilpin November 2015. The work with powdered charcoal and mixed media on paper, maps walks by explorers, including co-director of Big Ci Yuri Bolotin, over The Gardens of Stones, beside Wollemi National Park. The hanging gardens and unique pagodas of this World Heritage Wilderness is being threatened by long wall coal mining under the NP and coal fines pollution.

Image 4 (left) The River Ran Black, 2015 powdered charcoal, oil stick, on paper 170x76

Image 5 (left) Thorpes Folly via Hair of the Dog Ravine, 2016

Group Exhibition  Another Perspective Paper with Paper Grace Cossington Smith Gallery Wahroonga 2017

Part of commission for Art for the Planet Darling Quarter 2017 by aMBUSH Gallery

Marker on recycled acrylic, size variable, each 205x60cm

Not long after the shocking shooting of nine people in a prayer group in Charleston in June, I saw Jon Stewart, the American comedian, very agitated, commenting on this white supremacy act “This one is black and white”.

Selected –Sculptures in the Vineyard Wollombi 2015

Each sign 96x120cm, acrylic marker on glass

International maritime signal flags spelling

YANKEE OSCAR UNIFORM       MIKE ECHO       UNIFORM SIERRA

The installation on the glass shop front was made in response to the Charlie Hebdo shooting 7 January 2015 by Al-Qaeda terrorist group. Despite the death of 11 people the newspaper continued with the publication, the issue ran 7.95 million copies in six languages, compared to its print run of 60,000 in only French.

Installation on Perkins Street windows of the Emporium Newcastle, NANA Contemporary Art, part of #renewnewcastle 

Mixed media 140x87cm

The drawing pays homage to Mimmo Paladino’s bronze sculpture 1993 “Tana”. The background script on “Tana’s Defacto” refers to Australian Family Law Court ruling about Defacto relationships, which recognises same sex relationships as Defacto. Yet same sex marriages are still not legal in Australia whereas in Ireland, USA, Canada, New Zealand, South Africa, Greenland, Great Britain, Brazil, Denmark, Finland, France, Sweden and Spain it is accepted.

Selected Finalist: Fishers Ghost Art Prize Works on Paper, Campbelltown Art Centre 2015

Recycled Perspex, steel, cable ties, acrylic markers

Summer 2015 had unforgettable visual graphics presented by Vanessa O’Hanlon on National Weather ABC News 24. In some cases nearly all of Western Australia or South Australia is red for extreme fire danger , orange for severe, and yellow for very high, then the patches ofblack for catastrophic.

The ratings are prompts for people to stay safe and put their Bushfire Survival plan into action.

Bushfires are becoming more severe and frequent through extreme temperatures and winds, which are a subsequence of Climate Change.

These fire warning works have been updated at each exhibition with different

Fire

Selected Finalist- Hidden Rookwood Cemetery Sculpture Walk, 2015

Extreme Fire Warning

Solo Exhibition- Long Barn Montsalvat Melbourne, 2015

 Selected Finalist –Harbour Sculpture, Woolwich, 2015

Won Highly Commended- Sculpture on the Greens, Wyong 2015

Severe Fire Warning

Fire Warning

Selected finalist -Sculpture on the Greens

Gouache charcoal on paper. 57x231cm

Across the dirt road from Big Ci (Bilpin), is this World Heritage Wilderness The sheets of paper was rubbed against burnt tree stumps.

Milk crates and found objects; 210(h)x150(d)x120(w) 

Milk crates, found abandoned on city streets, are configured in this work to create altar spaces within a tree-like form. An everyday utilitarian object is transformed into a spiritual artefact; an old world concept of offerings is reinterpreted in an industrial New World.

'Peace Please' echoes Yoko Ono's 'Wish Tree' (1996), recreated in Sydney in 2013 as part of the Museum of Contemporary Art exhibition, War Is Over! (if you want it): Yoko Ono. Visitors to the exhibition were invited to tie personal wishes to six eucalyptus saplings, demonstrating the insuppressibly nature of hope.

In 'Peace Please' each altar space contains a collected treasure, or an offering for a world free of conflict - the artist's own wish and her vision of Utopia.

One treasure is a statue of Buddha, a universally recognised symbol of peace (regardless of an individual's religious conviction). Another is a Sydney Opera House snow dome, produced to help raise funds to cover the fine imposed on the protestors who painted 'No War' on the sails in March 2003 - just before US president Bush, supported by Australia, invaded Iraq. Australian troops only withdrew from Iraq as recently as 2011.

Here on our remote island we are isolated from recent conflicts in the Middle East, Afghanistan and Ukraine, and feel secure. But is Australia really the Utopia that refugees flee to, seeking asylum?

The words of protest that were once visible inside the snow dome have faded away over time, but 'No War'- and 'Peace Please' - remain urgent appeals.

Selected finalist: Chippendale New World Art Prize

Mixed media, 78(h) x 96(w)

“Cockatoo at Cassilis” was drawn over the top of an earlier drawing from Cockatoo Island with images of the Upper Hunter town Cassilis. The drawing was to be an illustration for “From Diary to large Scale Drawing,” a 2-day drawing workshop I was giving at Cassilis in August 2014. I had taught an earlier one here in 2012. One woman had driven an hour and a half to get there each day and home again. Cassilis is a small town with no petrol station. My friend Linda Gant has started a gallery café, Plough Inn Cassilis, in a weatherboard cottage opposite the old sandstone pub. Linda has applied for a Heritage Grant for the preservation of the old weatherboard Butcher shop to become a small Museum to preserve some of the heritage of the town.

Private Collection

UNI liquid chalk; Each flag 76(h) x 96(w) 

As Artist in Residence at Chris O’Brien Lifehouse, Royal Prince Alfred Hospital, for 3 weeks at end of April 2014, Ro drew on the glass balustrades international maritime signal flags. The installation was part of the art and medicine pilot program Arterie, founded by Deb Burdett and Amanda Solomon, in the new cancer clinic.

Drawn flags spell out words, including the name of the new cancer treatment centre LIFEHOUSE, DREAM, YES, ART, HOPE, LOVE,JOY even a misspelt LOFE (combining life and love?). The signals originated in1870’s with British Trade and are understood in 19 languages to communicate at sea, even today. The letters are spoken in the phonetic alphabet, such as alfa, bravo, charlie, delta, echo, foxtrot, golf, hotel, india, julia, kilo … which develop during WWII.

Each drawing is constructed with random straight lines drawn freehand onto the glass balustrades, building up a matrix of colour for each signal flag. The drawings ways are reminiscent of Ro Murray’s earlier sculptures of nests in PE piping and cable ties. The lines are woven without any consistent pattern or length or direction. The signal flags on glass are sometimes read in mirror reverse, just as they might be if flying from a ship. 

The project became a performance as the artist with the arterie orange apron and volunteer’s shirt, sat on a small orange stool, working her way back and forth around the central Atrium, alongside waiting areas, lounge rooms, on the café deck, along the bridges. Visible from the glass lifts and the street, the hand-drawn graphics create a life of their own, and give warmth to the hospital, reinforcing the architectural intention of transparency. 

Initially on Idraw with her phone, Ro copied the signal flags from the wheelhouse on a friends yacht, staying overnight in Pittwater.

Exhibited: Chris O’Brien Lifehouse, Royal Prince Alfred Hospital Sydney

Mixed media on rag paper, 150x150cm

The drawing is over an earlier work which had been worked over an even earlier work which had the text “the vacant block next door” referring to the block next door to me at Surfside Avenue Clovelly, which had weeds growing.

This final drawing has elements of sketch from Culburra, where the sea meets the clouds. At the time of drawing (18 October 2014) Pacific Island Warriors had blockade Newcastle Harbour to prevent Coal Ships departing, as a protest against Climate Change. Rising sea levels caused by Climate Change, the melting of polar ice caps, will dramatically affect their islands, and even their survival in some cases.

Selected Finalist –North Sydney Art Prize, Balls Head 2015

Selected Finalist –Blacktown City Art Prize,2014

Private collection

Mixed media on rag paper, 140 x 200 cm unframed diptych

Solo Exhibition- Skyfire Studio Leichhardt, 2015 

Found cast iron (3 dozen), steel, oyster shells; variable size Selected for Harbour Sculpture, Clarkes Point Woolwich and nominated with a stipend and purchased by private buyer.

Gouache, graphite, nail polish on paper, 76x167cm

This work started as part of a series of rubbings from the slate table at Murrays Cottage, Hill End, where I was Artist in Residence for February 2013 with Bathurst Regional Gallery. The complete set of 12 drawings include Ian Marr’s carved words (from 2004) of a poem by Dante, the local quartz and ochre soil, and the history of gold mining which had petered out by 1864.

These drawings relate to my sculptures in laminated curved Perspex with red nail polish X Marks the Spot I, II 2013. Today coal seam gas drilling is being proposed in the Great Barrier Reef, a World Heritage Park.  Nothing is safe; all is in possible danger of being undermined.

Finalist –Adelaide Perry Prize for Drawing 2014

Gaffa tape, leather, cotton, rubber, Approx - 2.1 (h) x 4.25(w) m 

World Vessel Earth is trying to communicate with us “enough is enough”. She has been sending signals that are ignored. Non-renewable world resources are being depleted, carbon emissions escalating, ocean temperatures rising, toxic non-biodegradable wastes affecting the seas.

These signal flags are used globally by ocean vessels and understood in 19 languages. Each symbol represents a letter of the NATO phonetic alphabet, used to communicate by phone and radio.

K (Kilo) “please communicate with me”
N C (November Charlie-no and yes) “I am in distress and require immediate assistance”
A D (Alpha Delta) “I am abandoning my vessel which has suffered a nuclear accident and is a possible source of radiation danger”
G M Golf Mike “I am abandoning my vessel”

This installation alludes to the early military defence of Sydney from the strategic position of Middle Head, and the 100 year anniversary of the Navy’s first entry into Sydney.

Commissioned: by Mosman Art Gallery for Middle Head: 33° 50’ S, 151°14’ E

2013 Marine ply, cotton canvas, plastic, steel, porcelain, aluminium; Size: variable installation, six figures 2m high 

I have a Sea Shepherd Tee with “extinction is forever” under a skull and cross bones. Reinforcing the message there is no coming back after the death of a species. The eco pirate organisation Sea Shepherd defends ocean wildlife worldwide. Amongst their many pursuits is “Operation Requiem”- a mission to save sharks.

My connection to marine wildlife is turtles, through my grandmother, whose family’s name was Turtle. Many varieties of turtles are critically endangered through long line fishing, ghost nets, and ingesting plastic bags.

These bound figures in “Extinction is Forever” are a reminder of the fragility of life.

Selected Finalist: Sculpture in the Vineyards 2013

Gouache and charcoal on paper; 112(h) x154(l) cm

The series “Four Degrees” combines sketches from my diary of an overseas trip during 2013, onto earlier drawings to make connection and references to the world being smaller (6 degrees of separation) and climate change. “Heavy Objects” are sculptural works from museums in Rome.

Gaffa tape and canvas, size variable

The town of Hill End is between Bathurst and Mudgee mid-west New South Wales. Hill End is destination point not a through road. The installation Endangered started with the wrapping the “koala sign,” before you enter Hill End, then the “school bus route” sign, and the tree trunks of Beyers Avenue outside Murrays Cottage.

The avenue of exotic trees was planted by Louis Beyers in 1877while mayor. Beyers and Bernhardt Holtermann had found the largest gold nugget in the world, in 1872 at Hill End.

The town was saved from deterioration by Parks and Wild Life in 1967, and most of the houses are leased from Parks with only a few scattered freeholds. Today to dig a fence post an archaeologist needs to be present; the koala has not been seen (by most); and the group of 6 high school kids take the bus two hour round trip to Mudgee. The primary school has 4 children.

Site specific installation Beyers Avenue Hill End, as artist in residence with Bathurst Regional Art Gallery February 2013

Gaffa tape, timber, soil, quartz, glass, synthetic glass, oyster shells, kangaroo poo, apples, steel. Approximately 600x800cm

The installation Once is a memory of what was Hill End. Once this building was a hospital. Once there were 28 pubs and once there was a race course here.

The installation resembles drawings of a plan and elevation of elements of the town. The tape on the floor marks beds once in this room. The specimens are reminders of what occurred here: mining leases, the processing of quartz for gold, orchards, timber getting for building and mines fresh oysters delivered in lead boxes from Sydney in horse drawn carts,.

The tape on the wall is the unpainted hardwood and wire boundary fences of houses and shops of the 8000 that once lived in Hill End.

Heritage is a living thing, not just a capsule in time. With only five children now at the school, the town of Hill End is endangered.

Site specific installation Jean Bellette Gallery Hill End as artist in residence with Bathurst Regional Art Gallery February 2013

Gaffa tape, 300x500x900

Site specific installation on the stage The Royal Hall Hill End built in 1873.

This work on the stage of the large brick hall built in 1873 has fences and outlines of buildings drawn with coloured tape on the primed canvas backdrop screens.

I felt the town of Hill End was “onstage”, being a significant living heritage item of Australia’s gold rush times. The predicament was Parks administering a living museum. Since 1967 Parks has provided a water supply and general maintenance to the town, with leases at low rents in return for upkeep of the properties. Around the town is a photographic record of the inhabitants, house and businesses by Beaufoy Merlin taken in 1872, and copies of paintings of the street scenes by Russel Drysdale from 1947, from the time the town became popular with artists. Today there are more kangaroos than inhabitants and supposedly 30,000 visitors (mostly school excursions) a year.

Where do you draw the line refers to the fragility of heritage. As a naive artist in residence for one month, I only touched on the surface of the politics involved.

Gaffa tape

This work marks the architectural features of the hall with coloured tape on the floor. The windows, doors and engage piers make a rhythm, reflecting the keys of the upright pianos down the end, and recalls the dances and gatherings here from when it was built in 1873.

Site specific installation The Royal Hall Hill End, as Artist in Residence with Bathurst Regional Art Gallery February 2013

Collage, mixed media 

“The Twins” is part of the series “Four Degrees” with “Valetta” and “Heavy Objects”, based on from my trip to Europe September 2013. The images in this drawing combine sketches from my diary in Rome, over an earlier drawing from 2009.

Private Collection

THE TWINS was included in www.sydneystoryfactory.org.au auction if you can tell a story… 2017, which raised $80,000 to run writing programs for kids across Sydney. The response to The Twins “You can hear everyone screaming at the horse at the grand ball. It’s hilarious” James from Woolloomooloo

Recycled plastic spools, bamboo, nylon orange rope, polystyrene

GONE FISHING once a note tacked to the door excusing you for nicking off. 

Fishing has a different context today with “don’t eat fish” signs around Sydney Harbour (because of heavy metals) or long-line-fishing with by-catch of drowned turtles, dolphins, sharks and birds. In other places fishing with dynamite has caused the depletion of sea grass. Fish become extinct, and the livelihood of subsistent villages threatened. 

The Great Pacific Garbage Patch, an enormous gyre of plastic and toxic chemicals, twice the size of Texas, has the plankton (necessary for carbon cycle in the ocean) count dangerously low. With low oxygen levels fish will not reach mature size. 

Fish farming is the new way to feed the earth’s growing population. Overcrowded pens for any species creates problems: stress means disease, hormones and antibiotics.

Selected Finalist: Sculpture in the Vineyard 2013

Found garden irrigation piping, twin; variable size, 38 pieces each about 70-110cm high, suspended 

This work represents pupae of butterflies hanging ready to emerge with favourable climate conditions. They are optimistic symbols for transformation, and imagined transient beauty for what they will emerge. Chrysalid is a made up word (similar to chrysalis). The Chrysalids is a title of a science fiction book by John Wyndham (1955), also called in the U.S. Re-birth, and the earlier manuscript was entitled Time for a Change. 

Exhibited: won Sculptures in the Gaol (Trial Bay) 2012, finalist Sculptures in the Vineyards 2012.

Recycled garden piping; variable size, 3 sheaths 180cm high

Sheaths of wheat are traditionally symbols of plenty, prosperity and blessing. Ironically the international seed and agrochemical company Monsanto Corporation has patented genetically modified sterile seeds to aggressively consolidate the world seed market. These new seeds have diverse implications, including the altering of the earth's biodiversity. Farmers will no longer be able to save seeds from year to year, or cross breed to adapt crops for local conditions. Crop uniformity increases vulnerability to pests and disease and heightens potential mass famine.

Exhibited: Sculptures in the Vineyards 2012
Won: (single piece on synthetic grass) The Environment Prize at Blacktown Art Prize 2013 Selected finalist: Sculptures in the Vineyards 2012, Willoughby Sculpture Prize 2013, (larger work of 5 pieces) Sculpture at Sawmillers 2014, 
Exhibited: Chris O’Brien Lifehouse Royal Prince Alfred Hospital 2014, as Artist in Residence with Arterie

Oiled steel, Jacobean oak chairs, cold cast bronze. (The feet were cast with help from sculptor Will Coles); variable size. 

Hopefully when we inherit (or give) it is a golden not a rotten egg. These chairs represent the coming together of a group or community, to make decisions for the long term, to pass on their legacy to the next generation. They will decide not to log ancient wilderness forests for power, and instead use renewable energy. This work was also called Biting the Hand... (2012), with live bush tucker seedlings planted in metal trays. The seedlings were planted by Willoughby Council in the gulley near the exhibition.

In this context the work questioned the extent to which we use, consume and waste, starting at home in the dining room. Sustainability issues such as energy required to make plastic water bottled, and the disposal of non-bio gradable materials such as plastic being dumped into the oceans. 

Finalist: Marrickville Contemporary Art Prize 2012; Blacktown City Art Prize 2012. Exhibited NurT-ure, Incinerator Art Space Willoughby 2012

Photos by Alex Wisser

Found cast iron and recycled corks, steel, water. 300cm diameter circle (with 38 pieces) 70cm high  

Moon Flower is inspired by circular moon gates in Chinese gardens. This flower is horizontal and has florets at random spaces, either tangential or radial, unlike the sunflower which has spiral patterns and is nearly vertical facing the rising Sun. These pods reflect the Moon which revolves around the Earth and whose pull of gravity affects water from ocean tides to menstrual cycles. The Moon was a guide for those that lived with the land: for the best time to fish, plants seeds or harvest.

Exhibited: Behind the Wall 2012 Mahratta Wahroonga, Sculptures in the Vineyards 2012.

Gouache, charcoal, conte on rag paper
Each diptych 90x137cm 
 

These drawings began in 2010 with my vertical laminated Perspex sculptures called Markers, inspired by Chinese scroll paintings. They recall my architecture student job making contour models. With the Year of the Water Dragon, marking my birth year, the drawings record current news events from Blanchet to Barry Humphries calling Roy Hill mine "Gina's Hole".

Pencil on paper, chalk markers on glass, size variable

As human population grows, our consumption of non-renewable resources increases – along with the production of toxic (and even radioactive as with Fukushima) and non- degradable waste, all becoming a dangerous threaten to the sustainability of the Planet.

How would the Earth communicate with us “enough is enough”?

HELP! HELP !

N C (November Charlie) no and yes in international maritime signal flags, when flown together means “I am in distress and require immediate assistance”

These flags of communication are used globally by ocean vessels and understood in 19 languages. The following flags are international signals used by ships at sea. They can be used to spell out short messages, or more commonly, used individually or in combination they have special meanings. Strung end to end and hung bow to stern from the rigging they are used to dress the ship for ceremonial and festive occasions.

Each symbol represents a letter of the NATO phonetic alphabet, used to communicate by phone and radio. The alphabet was developed during the WWII-

Alpha, Bravo, Charlie, Delta, Echo, Foxtrot, Golf, Hotel, India, Juliet, Kilo, Lima, Mike, November, Oscar, Papa, Quebec, Romeo, Sierra, Tango, Uniform, Victor, Whiskey, X-ray, Yankee, Zulu

Solo Exhibition – Nurture The Incinerator Willoughby November Charlie 2012

Selected show -Langue Peacock Gallery Auburn HELP HELP 2012

Selected Finalist- InSitu13SIRIUS 2013, Mosman Council

Mixed media 140x130cm

Valetta is part of the series "Four Degrees" from my trip to Rome, France, Sicily and Malta in September 2012. The series combine small quick pen sketches from my diaries, into large scale compositions with mixed media, either over or collaged from other works. The earlier images provide a framework, partially covered or highlighted as the drawing progresses. This gives me a continuum between where I live in Australia and my recent trip to the other side of the world. The scale is distorted and not relative to the actual size of the objects. For me "one world" feels more appropriate than ever. We used to talk about "six degrees of separation" connecting us. Today we have Instagram, Skype, and the EU with one currency. Now "four degrees" rise in the ocean temperature will be a massive economic disaster to the whole World.

Prizes: Commissioned by Mary Turco, solicitor Newtown

Gold paint, ceramic aluminium

25x25x25cm, edition of 3 each

These three found electrical insulators facing towards the light are symbols of renewable energy. They are ready- mades, produced in China 1990, now altered with gold paint as something precious.

Exhibited- Solo exhibition Nurture 2012 Incinerator Art Space Willoughby

Collage gouache, ink, graphite on paper. 91x187 cm

Culburra combines sketches of vegetation from the south coast NSW and central Australia: shrubs and shadows.

Salt, found glass and acrylic, organic material

This work engages with the theme of sustainable agriculture. “Salt of the earth” used to be an expression for a decent, dependable and unpretentious person. Now however “the salt of the earth” salinity is an ecological factor of considerable importance affecting both the land and the oceans.

Poly water pipe, cable ties; varying sizes maximum 3m long 

This work engages with the idea of water as an essential element that has not only been commodified but also compromised by the pressures of human production and climate change. Configured like large nuggets of water, “blue gold” refers to the status of water as a privately owned commodity, with the rights to it sold off to the world market.

Exhibited: Insitu II Festival of Mosman (Westpac Bank foyer) 2011; Material World ANCA 2012

Conte, gouache on black paper; 1.5x1m 

A response to the catastrophic flooding and tropical cyclones of Eastern Australia early 2011, which are indicators of the global environmental crisis of rising ocean temperature and acid levels. This work uses the Richard Diebenkorn Ocean Park series as a structure. This work has reversed Diebenkorn's tonality (like a negative), by “flooding” the picture with an intensely black background. The jug and the teapot have two allusions – the idea of “still life” as nature morte (dead holes in the ocean) and overflowing containers (inundation).

Selected: Adelaide Perry Drawing Prize 2011

Organic material (St. Johns wort, Hypericum perforatum), hemp; variable size 

This work being made from natural organic material (a noxious pastoral weed) is ephemeral. The material was harvested from Cassilis, in the upper Hunter Valley, and tied into bunches by hand. Strictly speaking it is not completely carbon neutral, as it was transported by a diesel ute to Sydney as a back load in disused wool bales. The bundles are like broom heads, sweeping away the idea of sculpture being an object, made from a precious material, or transformed by fire, and covered with a protective or decorative finish.

Carbonised and oiled marine plywood, ceramic electrical insulators, steel; 5 life size figures, each 1.8m high 
 

These figures refer to our use of non-renewable energy in every aspect of our daily life in Western society: from heating to cooling; lighting; food production and the transportation of goods. The sculptures suggest in an ironic sense that contemporary man is “power-full”.

Won: Sculptures in the Gaol 2011
Selected: Sculpture on the Greens 2012

Found net, lead sinkers, polystyrene, found plastic bottles, fishing rod, lids, oyster and sea snail shells, cuttlefish bone. 7 hangings 3m high  

This work is a series of knot hangings made from shark net washed up on Bronte Beach, with a midden under each of marine debris. Each hanging is different, resembling a trophy fishing catch, and reminding us of bi-catch dolphins and turtles caught in long-line trawling nets, or ghost nets. The title refers to the alarming rising temperature and acid levels of the oceans.

Selected: Willoughby Sculpture Prize 2011; Exhibited “Small Works in a large Universe” INDEX Space St Peters; and ATVP Newtown 2011.

Organic material (St. Johns wort, Hypericum perforatum), steel; 270x170x100(h)cm 

St. Johns wort was introduced into Australia in the 1800s for gardens and is now considered to be a noxious weed. Paradoxically, for thousands of years it was used broadly for medical purposes and today as an anti-depressant. The “heal all” red sap was referred to as the “blood of Christ”. It is harvested on the European summer solstice, adopted as John the Baptist’s birthday. Wort is old English for herb or plant.

Exhibited: ExVoto: Joseph Beuys INDEX Space 2011 

Finalist: Sculpture in the Gaol 2012

Found cast iron (33cm long), steel, water; variable size 

Originally, these were compression vessels from trains, but now they represent boats reminiscent of Noah’s Ark. In a metaphorical sense they represent the idea of survival. A sanctuary not only from the floods and tsunamis we have seen in 2011, but protection from a toxic environment.

Selected: Sculptures in the Vineyards 2011; UWS Sculpture Prize 2012

Gouache, charcoal, conte on rag paper
Each diptych 90x137cm 

This work continues to use Diebenkorn's lines like oceanographic transects to study ocean life or the lack of it. The series responds to decreasing plankton counts in oceanic gyre through plastic marine pollution and decrease in light. Plankton not only are a crucial source of food to larger, aquatic organisms such as fish and whales but an important part of ecosystems and biogeochemical cycles including the oceans carbon cycle on the up take of carbon dioxide. "The Great Pacific Garbage Patch" between Japan and California, is thought to be twice the size of Texas, and growing.

Won: Works on Paper Blacktown Art Prize, 2012

Conte, gouache on black paper 

This work responds to the extinction of many marine species, particularly species of turtles through plastic bag ingestion, entrapment in ghost nets, and long line fishing.

Won: Highly Commended at Muswellbrook Art Prize 2011; and The Art Reference Group Prize at Blacktown Art Prize 2011

Acrylic chalk, ink and shellac on ply; 321x234 cm

This painting reflects the ruggedness of the terrain and the loss of life at Gallipoli. The cut dividing the painting is a trench cut through the earth or ‘No Man’s Land’ dividing the Allies and the Turks. Neither side is worshipped nor demonised. The Turk leader Ataturk said (1934) “your sons…have become our sons”. They were all heroes who shed their blood in war.