Dates: 15 August - 30 January 2022
Times: Wednesday - Sunday; 10am - 4pm
Location:Santos Museum of Economic Botany, Schomburgk Pavilion, Adelaide Botanic Garden.
Cost: FREE entry
This Guildhouse Collections Project provided artists, Laura Wills and Louise Flaherty, with the opportunity to research within the SA Seed Conservation Centre and Adelaide Botanic Garden’s extensive historical, scientific and living collections.
In the resulting work, the duo celebrate flora and highlight human and plant relationships with a focus on vulnerable and threatened South Australian native plants.
This reflective and celebratory project comments on destructive colonisation and the beauty of nature by looking closely at the plants and their relationships, culminating in collaborative works on paper and ephemeral painting workshops.
Plant Notes is accompanied by sound work, an ephemeral art tour developed with Belinda Gehlert and Naomi Keyte.
The sound piece, designed to be experienced within Adelaide Botanic Garden, provides audiences with an experiential tour encouraging movement and thoughtfulness within the natural environment.
Visitors are encouraged to bring their own device and earphones to listen to the sound work.
Its development has been made possible through Australia Council for the Arts Adapt relief funding.
Thursday 16 September, 6pm
Schomburgk Pavilion, Adelaide Botanic Garden
Nature Festival: Plant Notes Artist Workshop
Thursday 30 September, 10.30am - 12pm
Schomburgk Pavilion, Adelaide Botanic Garden
Laura Wills is an Adelaide-based multidisciplinary artist based at Central Studios. Traversing the boundaries of drawing she explores social and environmental themes through found materials, collaborative processes and community- based projects to create hybrid works that are communicative in nature and connect us to the environment.
With a Bachelor of Visual Arts and Applied Design from Adelaide Centre of the Arts (2003), and a Bachelor of Visual Arts Honors from South Australian School of Art (2011) she has exhibited nationally and internationally and has worked collaboratively with many artists including Anna Dowling during a residency at SAHMRI; Elisabeth Close as part of an artist in resident at Flinders Medical Centre and Louise Flaherty in the creation of Grassy Shadows workshops for Nature Festival 2020. In 2017 she was awarded the Fleurieu Art Prize and in 2019 the National Works on Paper prize both for her collaborative work with James Tylor.
Recent projects include Parklands Project and a 4-week Country Arts SA residency at Palace of Production, Kangaroo Island. Current Wills Projects works with William Cheesman include Tiny Gems, for City of Port Adelaide Enfield, installing a mural in Clare with Rosina Possingham and developing public art for Rural City of Murray Bridge.
Louise Flaherty is an artist and arts worker based in Adelaide. Informed by quiet reflection on the natural environment, her current practice spans drawing and installation with a focus on community driven projects.
Founding Director of Downtown Arts Space, she has has worked at the South Australian School of Art, was Arts Program Manager at Barkly Regional Arts in the Northern Territory and studied Visual Arts at the South Australian School of Art, receiving first class Honours.
She has exhibited widely and in 2019 was the winner of the Tatiara Art Prize at Walkway Gallery. During a residency at The Mill in Adelaide CBD she created work based upon research of local native plants which was expanded upon in a later residency at Sauerbier House Cultural Exchange, Port Noarlunga. In 2018 she was recipient of a Guildhouse LimberUp mentorship with artist Laura Wills, focusing on community engagement and participatory practice. In 2019 she was Artist in Residence at the Women’s and Children’s Hospital and more recent projects include presenting a new collaborative work for OSCA’s Parklands Project, participating in Vitalstatistix’s Adhocracy program; and creating an collaborative audio-led workshop for Nature Festival. Louise is a studio resident at Post Office Projects, Port Adelaide.
Follow Laura and Louise’s research and workshops at plantnotes.com.au and view their Vitalstatistix residency with Belinda Gehlert and Naomi Keyte here.
Image:
Threatened Night, 2021
Louise Flaherty and Laura Wills
pastel, pencil and pigment on rag paper
75 x 55cm
Photograph Grant Hancock
15 March 2024
The Board of the Botanic Gardens and State Herbarium is very pleased to announce that the Director of the Botanic Gardens and State Herbarium of South Australia, Mr Michael Harvey, has been elected as the new Chair of the Council of Heads of Australian Botanic Gardens.
21 November 2023
Adelaide Botanic Garden has been announced as a 'Garden of the World Worth Travelling For in 2024' at the International Garden Tourism Awards.
