Forest Keegel

Weaving the River Artists creative concept

The artists heard many stories from local people, including those told at Story Day and also from Interviews conducted by Geoff Park. We also spent time with the river together and jointly came up with the overarching concept of imagining the river rising so high that the former Railway Station buildings of the Hub and garden were inundated with water. What would the river leave behind- rushes and grasses, debris, plants, river critters real and imaginary, abstract and figurative. Logs, stones sand gravel.

We are inspired by the powerful flow of water and they way it carves valleys, moves rocks and giant logs around. All the aquatic and plant life the river sustains and the way it has brought people together for this project.

We are developing creative and artistic responses that incorporate the distant past and hopeful future of the Loddon and are in keeping with the Heritage values of the station building in particular to reference the garden as part of a domestic space from a time when the Station Masters family lived there.

We are working with community members to create River Critters to be added to the reo mesh of the upper part of the fence in front of the buildings. The lower area will have weavings made of rushes and reeds and a garden bed in curved corten steel edging which will be planted with

Indigenous plants from Newstead Natives such as Old Man’s Beard -clematis, bluebells, billy buttons, grasses and ground covers.

Weaving the River Story Day was a marvellous day at Newstead Arts Hub,

People came from all across the catchment to connect and create with the Loddon River Bulutjal Yaluk. Aunty Marilyne Nicholls led a Smoking Ceremony to begin Story Day and launch the Weaving the River project. Bec Phillips invited attendees to express their connection to the Loddon by joining a dance ceremony where they danced the river cloth to life and wove it between the fence posts fashioned from steel rail track that will form part of the structure of the woven fence in front of Newstead Arts Hub.

Nicole Howie Waterwatch Educator from North Central Catchment Management Authority hosted a very popular waterbugs activity and river bird search.Yarning Circle with Laurel Freeland wonderful storytelling about the river expressions of love, funny stories, personal tales of living within the flood system, changes over time and way back in to the past.

Inside the Arts Hub the River exhibition gave visitors an opportunity to see Bulutjal Yaluk Loddon River through the artist’s eyes before they went in to the River Room and learnt some river history through photos from Newstead Historical society, and old maps unearthed by Chris Johnston. A 1940’s aerial photo of bare river banks denuded of trees formed a contrast against current images of the river courtesy of Geoff Park and Newstead Landcare’s marvellous revegetation and flood footage taken by drone. People created postcards to the River as part of their family and added to the community river map.

The sharing of stories is forming a conceptual basis for the Art Hub’s fence line community art project led by artists Aunty Marilyne Nicholls, Roger McKindley and Forest Keegel.

Gathering to Gather materials at Antares Iron Art Garden Punt Rd Newstead

May 30th 10 people gathered together at Roger’s to discuss materials for the fence and chat about working with found and reclaimed materials. Roger pointed out to people what materials will be useful, he has also set up a depot at his place -a trailer on the front fence line so people can donate materials.