"Dark Snow"
Belconnen Community Gallery. 23 October - 8th December 2023
The starting point for this exhibition is a series of snowscapes taken during recent heavy snow fall around the Snowy Mountains area. I intended to publish them as is - however, one thing I noticed at the time was that the further one got from isolation of the pristine snowfall and the nearer to the resorts, hostels, cafes and pubs of human habitation: the less stunning white the snow. The more dug up by feet, skis and snowboards and the more tainted by emissions, black in certain places: behind cafes, pubs and other hostelries. Ironically spoiling the very vistas people go there for.
It occurred to me that this is a common bond that ties humanity together wherever they are – a love of nature, paradoxically combined with the less positive bond of global climate change, and bespoiling of that nature. Whilst nature prevails for now it is inevitably becoming something different, less pure.
Therefore, I reversed out the images to turn the bright snow whites to black and grey; an extreme mirroring of that experience in The Snowies, and perhaps a glimpse of a future where humans have destroyed the very nature they claim to love so much.
These are shown alongside the original images for contrast.
It occurred to me that this is a common bond that ties humanity together wherever they are – a love of nature, paradoxically combined with the less positive bond of global climate change, and bespoiling of that nature. Whilst nature prevails for now it is inevitably becoming something different, less pure.
Therefore, I reversed out the images to turn the bright snow whites to black and grey; an extreme mirroring of that experience in The Snowies, and perhaps a glimpse of a future where humans have destroyed the very nature they claim to love so much.
These are shown alongside the original images for contrast.