Bianca Hester does a lot of walking. The local artist, whose work Circuits of Solar Descent will feature in this year’s Sculpture in the Garden, started the ritual when moving from Melbourne to Sydney for work in 2013. This practice changed her and the way she interacted with the landscape, and has gone on to inform her research and her work. Now, as part of her project for April's Sculpture in the Garden exhibition, Bianca is organising four walks in and around Wollongong Botanic Garden.
“Coming from Melbourne, a city whose originally swampy landscapes were lost to colonial development and a dominant European urban aesthetic, the sandstone landscape of the Sydney Basin taught me something about the place in a material way that I had not experienced up to that point,” Bianca said.
“Then moving to West Wollongong immediately after the birth of our daughter, my interest and engagement with place, geology and ecology only deepened here while living on Dharawal land.
“Walking as a research process, but also as a form of public engagement has been a key part of my work since around 2015.
“It’s been a useful way to develop relationships with people in place, and to learn more about the multi-faceted dimensions of the locations I’ve worked in.
"My key areas of interest are the deep time stories that underpin these locations, which connect with First Nations knowledges, geologic materiality and environmental histories. I’m also interested in the way that geology (and subsequently the extraction of geologic materials), has shaped the place and its social histories.”
Circuits of the Solar Descent is one of 18 finalists in the biennial exhibition and features at its core two circles of grass, 11 to 15 metres in diameter. In consultation with the Botanic Garden, these patches have not been mown since the start of the year and have since begun to flourish with new life.
Bianca said: “I’ve noticed that allowing a relatively small area of grass to grow encourages the presence of more diverse plant and insect life …
"Additionally, the acoustic space of the grass was buzzing with crickets, and visually flickering with moths and beetles moving about. It was beautiful to hear and see!”
The circles themselves, marked with ‘haptic ground sculptures’ will become the meeting points for the walking events. And here is where visitors will be able to engage with the surrounding areas, including the gardens themselves, Keira Green Corridor and the endangered Illawarra Lowlands Grassy Woodlands.
The walks, which are free but must be booked, will be guided by local leaders Leon Fuller and Emma Rooksby (Growing Illawarra Natives), James Beattie (the garden's Living Collections Curator), Dr Beth Mott (Senior Threatened Species Officer, NSW Department of Environment) and Dharawal Wodi Wodi Elder Aunty Joyce Donovan.
Bianca said, “Overall, Circuits of Solar Descent interweaves sculpture, storytelling and social engagement to explore plant life as holders of ancient temporalities and Dharawal knowledge, asking what future forms of care of Illawarra’s ecosystems demands amid climate crisis.
“It’s about using art practice as a platform to raise awareness about the precious local ecologies of the Illawarra, and to help enable participants to learn about how they can contribute to caring for them too, by aligning the project with advocacy currently being performed by local community leaders.”
To book the free Circuits of Solar Descent walking events, head here. Follow Bianca on her website and on Instagram
Sculpture in the Garden runs from 1-30 April at the Wollongong Botanic Garden