Artlink review - Melinda Rankin

Murray Bridge Regional Gallery 24 July  31 August 2006

Confluence presents five artists' thoughtful responses to the strong presence of the Murray, the abundance of the wildlife it supports, and the impact of its use for agricultural purposes. As part of the Murray/Darling Palimpsest 6 project, Confluence is one of a number of exhibitions in regional Australia working on similar themes.

John Hayward's thought-provoking series of small fibreglass canoes are cast from the bark of the Red Gum. The Memory Vessels series provides a memorial to the trees' lives – the blackened surface after a bush fire, the scribbly path of a moth larva eating its way to freedom and the graffiti of text carved harshly into the bark. Desert Harvest carries a carefully placed load of rice, drawing attention to the irony of growing a thirsty crop in a dry land.

​Photos on this page by J.Hayward and M. Kluvanek.