My next exhibition will be in Gladstone Regional Gallery on the topic of using bioplastics to replace single-use plastics which are causing such havoc in our oceans. It will be installed on March 6 and runs until April 15. Here is some of the thinking behind it. If you live in the sera and would like to attend the opening, […]
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I have had numerous requests lately for the instructions on how to make paper from Bunya. The parts I use are what Auntie Beverly Hand, Kabi Kabi elder and bunya advocate, calls the shuckings. The shuckings are the parts we peel off when we get the kernel out of a bunya cone. Now I’m going to explain that papermaking is […]
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Apart from art-making, my other great passion is my organic garden. I trained as a permaculture designer when my daughter was small and I have never lost the love of growing my own food. As the seasons progressed I noticed that at times in the garden there are a lot of stalky prunings and trimmings. When the lemongrass plant dies […]
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Date: 2pm – 5pm Saturday November 27 2021 Venue: Alluvial Contemporary Art Space 3/39 Monkland Street Gympie Qld 4570 Cost: $55 per participant This workshop will combine creative paper-making with positive self-transformation! In the process of making their Duets installation, “Reclaiming Women’s Voices”, Lesa and Zela spent time comparing notes on the messages they received during their own upbringings, especially […]
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Over recent months, a major project has been taking taking up a lot of space in my studio – the Duets project. This is a local partnership initiative which paired up artists with different practices to see what creative endeavours would unfold. This exciting project has seen me working every week with my Duets buddy and friend, Lesa Bell. Lesa […]
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After the Award There has been a lot of interest in my mixed media sculpture, My Mother’s Treasures and this has been heightened after it became the winner of the Locals Award in the Hugo de Rietz art competition at Gympie Regional Gallery. On the night of the opening, before the prizes were awarded, quite a number of people came […]
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This year I was honoured to be one of a select group of artists invited to paint a plinth for the Mary Valley Arts Link. Painting this plinth for the Mary Valley group really took me back to a period that was a life-changing time in my life, starting at Easter 2006: that was when Premier Peter Beattie announced his […]
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Lesa Bell interviews Zela Bissett about her arts practice and papermaking among the gardens that inspire her and provide some of the raw materials for her artworks. Zela Bissett’s studio has been a popular attraction over the years at Gympie’s Studio Trails. Zela reports that when visitors arrive they would often be as interested in the garden as the artworks. […]
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Zela Bissett looks back on the origins of a groundbreaking exhibition at Gympie Regional Gallery and a robust tradition of interdisciplinary arts/since/activism which underpins it. In August 2019, a group of regional artists from the wildflower regions of South east Queensland met for a weekend of walking, talking and art-making. This weekend was enriched by the guidance of Butchulla Knowledge-holder […]
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As I mentioned in my previous post, my daughter-in-law Clare and I have been working on a series of video tutorials to teach some of the earth-friendly fibre arts I practise at Papernicus Fine Art Studio. The intention is to help people, especially when confined at home, to do some satisfying artistic projects. We have now loaded 4 videos, which […]
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