Presentation – Serendipity: Part 3
Statement of Meaning
Experiment 3 – Aftermath
For the past three months, we have been surrounded by fire. 57% of Australians have been directly affected. Here in Sydney, it’s just haze and smoke we experience. Without heading out to the affected areas, we have little understanding of the destruction.
My third experiment looks at the effect of fire on wood.
The first part of this experiment was to create a conceptual piece that allows the viewer to experience the tangible and physical effect of fire on wood. Two glass vessels sit side-by-side, the first contains 140g of woodchips and the second contains 20g of wood ash. The wood ash is all that is left after burning 140g of woodchips. Although we’re aware that burning wood results in ash, presenting it in this almost clinical way gives a more precise sense of the impact. If this is what happens to 140g, imagine the effect to the 10 million hectares and 2,000 houses that have burnt.
For the second part of this experiment, I used burnt woodchips to sketch a landscape of the bushfire aftermath. The burnt chips are incredibly fragile and crumble in your fingers. The resulting sketch is equally as delicate with much of it made up of just ash resting on the paper. I photographed the sketch before moving it to preserve the outcome. Despite my efforts to fix the sketch, much of it disappeared the moment it was moved. The sketch and the photograph are displayed alongside some burnt wood chips. Viewers are encouraged to touch, experience and sketch with the burnt chips. By handling the burnt woodchips, you get a visceral feel of the aftermath of a fire.