Bush Fire (2010)

Fire is an integral part of the Australian landscape with many native plants using heat or smoke to assist with propagation, a regenerative effect that contrasts with the shells of burnt out buildings following bushfires. It is somewhat of a contradiction then, that the sculpture Bush Fire consists of several ‘burnt trees’ made from salvaged corrugated iron; even more so when their construction allows fires to be lit within openings built into their sides. Despite this incongruity, the colour of the weathered, galvanised steel is reminiscent of the dead, bushfire killed eucalypts on the slopes of Mt. Wellington.