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Lot Essay
'In 1975 I began to be interested in the miracle that was taking place in the centre of Australia at L Eyre -- it was full of water the whole 175 kilometres of it. Geologists subsequently found out it had not had as much water in it for 500 years. ...
'In 1973-74, Lake Eyre filled with water. It was the first time in white man's civilization. What is commonly known as the 'dead heart' became instantaneously the living heart. Hundreds of millions of birds, mammals, insects and flowers rushed towards its abundant void. The lake is paradoxical, conceptual, for it is impossible to view it without thinking of the empty lake, Malcolm Campbell's speed test ground; its superabundance now and its future emptiness. This series is a celebration of that rare moment. ...
'When L. Eyre filled, the area changed its whole character. What CT Madigan described as one of the most forbidding places on earth -- became an earthly paradise. Life throbbed & buzzed on the edge of the lake & the lake itself was full of fish. The edge of the lake however was surrounded by an unpleasant black mud that was not unlike sump oil. I'm trying to get at the organic urge moving towards life's energies. A doctor, not necessarily a very visual one, said to me it reminded him of a womb with all the organisms surging dynamically around it. I rather liked that idea -- a certain transferability or image.
'I am rather taken by the bubbly aquatint & sugar lift painted over the top of it. I have engraved on it in parts just as a counterpoise against the globby fattiness of the sugar lift.
'... Lake that is no longer there, we loved you.' (J. Olsen, op. cit., pp.54-62)
'In 1973-74, Lake Eyre filled with water. It was the first time in white man's civilization. What is commonly known as the 'dead heart' became instantaneously the living heart. Hundreds of millions of birds, mammals, insects and flowers rushed towards its abundant void. The lake is paradoxical, conceptual, for it is impossible to view it without thinking of the empty lake, Malcolm Campbell's speed test ground; its superabundance now and its future emptiness. This series is a celebration of that rare moment. ...
'When L. Eyre filled, the area changed its whole character. What CT Madigan described as one of the most forbidding places on earth -- became an earthly paradise. Life throbbed & buzzed on the edge of the lake & the lake itself was full of fish. The edge of the lake however was surrounded by an unpleasant black mud that was not unlike sump oil. I'm trying to get at the organic urge moving towards life's energies. A doctor, not necessarily a very visual one, said to me it reminded him of a womb with all the organisms surging dynamically around it. I rather liked that idea -- a certain transferability or image.
'I am rather taken by the bubbly aquatint & sugar lift painted over the top of it. I have engraved on it in parts just as a counterpoise against the globby fattiness of the sugar lift.
'... Lake that is no longer there, we loved you.' (J. Olsen, op. cit., pp.54-62)