Helen Sheil (2017)
While there are other grand stories that originated in humble surroundings triggered in our memory by images of a bright star in a clear sky. They were from another time. So the invitation to make our way to Josie’s camp on her mother’s bee farm, to speak aloud thoughts held silently in our hearts created an opportunity for another grand story of hope to emerge in the quiet of the small clearing between the highway and the lake that many have heard about but like the mythical Camelot few have entered. Listening to a snippet of Maisie Byrne’s poems of life on Lake Tyers in the 1930’s written in pencil, on lined pages held together with a nappy pin you glimpse a life surrounded by beauty and abundant happiness. (extract) So listen and I’ll tell you Of the bush I love so well And all the pleasures round about The spot in which I dwell. A land of wide horizons Of mountains plain and lake There’s pleasures here for all of you Whichever way you take. There’s bushland all around us So friendly and so green I’d like to tell you all about The wonders I have seen For the bush is full of interest For those with eyes to see There’s living things hide in the scrub And almost every tree.
Maisie offers such a different view to that of ‘legendary’ bush Poets who wrote of families battling to clear trees struggling with drought, fires and flies, the hardship, heartbreak and loneliness, especially for women. Maisie’s daughter, Josephine Jakobi Has eye’s to see the beauty and the creativity to map the complexity of life in the lake we love. Her unique style a Josephication of the world around her is immediately recognizable. Her art, paying attention to the cycle of seasons the length of days relating to the ebb and flow of salt and fresh water mingling is stitched, inked and embossed onto linen immersed for weeks in the lake to impregnate the fabric with qualities of the constantly halocline. A visit to the bee farm is an invitation to immerse ourselves in this time and place to bee present. To re-connect with nature’s gallery of life.