Rethinking the Relationship with Nature in Contemporary Australia: Salvaged Materials, Colonial History, and Cross-Cultural Narratives

Abstract

This doctoral project analyses Eurocentric and anthropocentric ideologies about nature, tracing them back to the eighteenth century invasion and colonisation of Australia. This research informs my series of unmonumental sculptural objects that address environmental issues and concerns in Australia. In these works, I explore the power of the visual metaphor offered by salvaged materials (what some might call ‘rubbish’, a term I unpack), utilising two contrasting techniques. The first involves incorporating the qualities of trompe l'oeil, which I use as a form of mimetic critique. The second involves drawing upon a junk aesthetic that rejects orderly for disorderly, elaborate for informal, whereby I seek to reflect the dynamics of unmonumentality. As detailed in this exegesis, I have adopted a self-reflexive and interpretative approach, mindful of how I belong to a colonising culture. Drawing on decolonising methodologies, my work aims to question colonial history and to challenge dominant ideologies underpinning white Australian attitudes and practices towards the natural terrain. My purpose is to be open to new ways of thinking about the connection to land and self, initiated through the theoretical frameworks of ecological thought and ecofeminism which highlight different narratives and knowledge systems existing within Aboriginal and white Australian culture. I ask how can objects created from salvaged materials question colonial history, challenge dominant ideologies, and engage with cross-cultural narratives, enabling us to rethink the relationship with nature in contemporary Australia?