F7 – Checking for ripeness – squeeze gently 2018  archival ink jet on cotton rag​

Checking for ripeness
When I travel I want to experience the destination through the art and culture, which of course includes food and wine. Not only does this mean regional specialities it also means going to the local markets and supermarkets, not specifically to purchase anything, but to imbibe the atmosphere, the looks , the smells, to imagine which staples I would be buying in this supermarket if I lived here and which fresh produce I would be purchasing in the markets. To become familiar with the names, to acquire some of the confidence of an (almost) local, to think, yes, if I were stranded here I would not be totally lost. In other words, I want to eat and drink locally, such as in Australia I do not want to drink French wine in the Hunter Valley, or in Barcelona I want to drink locally, not buy Jacobs Creek in a Barcelona supermarket because it is the only brand I recognise.
I also expect that the regional guides published for tourists to be accurate and informative, to give a sense of what to do and see, what to eat and drink. Which is why I found a promotion for a South Australian wine region both outrageous and hysterically funny. The image depicted a man reclining on a picnic rug in a bucolic setting, beside him an ice bucket with a bottle of wine and a pineapple.
I will list just some of the incongruities: Pineapples are really not a standard crop grown in any South Australian wine region. It is almost impossible to find Pineapples and a compatible wine in any list of food and wine matches. Since there are no glasses or table ware depicted, I must assume that the pineapple will be ripped apart with the bare hands and the wine drunk from the bottle. Judging by the bulge, it would only be fair to ask if there is another pineapple in the gentleman’s pocket or he was really pleased to see the photographer ?
My reaction to this is indicated by the figure to the right, laughing and holding a mask of the existential scream from Edvard Munch’s painting. The collage has been built around innuendo in the common phrase used in food writings “To check for ripeness, squeeze gently” and have added to the mix beetroot and pumpkin, vegetables that it would be futile to squeeze. To complete the satire, an indigenous person from South America, the original home of the pineapple, now looks on.

F25 The Beach 2016 spice jars, shells, glass, plastic et al  

The Beach
​When I was growing up in a small seaside town in Queensland, quite a number of activities involved acquiring food, some were tasks like maintaining plots of pineapples and bananas, raising ducklings and chickens, gathering mushrooms in the neighbour’s cow paddock ( that farmer also introduced me to molasses which he kept to feed his poddy-calves, I adored it). Other neighbours had mango trees, mulberries and guavas. I remember eating parrot pie, my elder brother had shot the birds. We only had it the once though, they were so small, all bones and no meat, it was not worth the effort. But the sea and its bounty was a different matter, we fished, for yabbies and eels in waterholes, oysters and mud crabs in the mangroves and row boats out to the whiting grounds or to the reef. My dad and his mates netted Australian Salmon and Mullet from the beach, the women scaled and cleaned the catch, the men cooked on a wood fire, leftovers were made into fishcakes, taken home in the esky on the remains of the block of ice that had cooled the beer.
This sculpture embodies the wealth of our seas today through materials collected on walks along my local beach; crustacea, cuttlefish, molluscs, pippi shells, glass, plastic...... 

The morning beach walk takes about 30 minutes from the headland to rocky headland, an hour all up. When I first started almost no plastic was in evidence, or did I just not notice? Now I collect any plastic found, most mornings the beach is relatively clean. On others 3 or 4 pieces are found, the most common are fishermen's bait bags and bits of helium balloons, followed by water bottles and small food wrappers but once or twice a year, after rough seas, it can be one to two kilos of plastic usually one or two large plastic containers or bags and lots of small pieces. In a world context I suppose this local beach is probably almost pristine.

But the worthless detritus discarded by an unthinking humanity is not all that is found on the beach, on this bright December morning, Pig-face, that sprawling seaside succulent flashing purple flowers at the sun is covered in ripe red fruit. Soft and sweet salty spheres of white flesh squeezed into the mouth is the perfect way to finish a walk, just a few, leave some for the other animals that patrol the beaches and dunes, leave enough for re-generation. Besides, I grow it in my garden, though my fruit is not ripe as yet.
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Fruit of Pig-face, Carpobrotus glaucescens, which grows on Australia’s eastern seaboard

F99 Guiding the spirit to Elysium 2018 archival inkjet on canvas

Death
I never experienced death, 'close up' that is, until my life partner, Gavin, died. After being together nigh on 40 years, I came home one day and found him stretched out on the lounge, a faint smile on his face but he had departed. Now ten years later trying to remember how death affected me, the emotions and thoughts over the hours and days that followed; blackness, a blankness that eliminated all thought, an automaton going through the process with doctor, police, ambulance, overwhelming grief , sadness, anger that he had left without me, anger at the woman at the supermarket checkout saying "Have a nice day", sudden little bursts of lust - driven by a primitive fear of loss of love and tenderness, the ache of an emptiness that lies within, the dullness of life continuing, the comfort and oblivion of wine until finally the realization that life is continuing, you are participating, day by day the grief fades then only memories of good times float on the surface of a deep pool that you do not want disturbed.
The Tiwi people of Northern Australia believe that when a person dies, a Black Cockatoo guides the spirit to the afterlife. Which is why, in this collage of images from World War I to Vietnam, I arranged for the Cockatoo's wingtip to brush the central figure, an Australian soldier, identity unknown, who died in World War I. The image was taken by a German soldier who handed in the photograph after he was captured. "Guiding the spirit to Elysium"  is another art work that continues an anti-war theme, with Death leading the dance to the machines of war.