And So I Called it Cauldron Falls  2012

Medium: drypoint

Matrix: polycarbonate
Edition: 10
Paper: Hahnemuhle 300gsm
Image Size: 20x20cm
Paper Size: 38x55cm

 

I love to go walking and exploring in new places, both urban and remote, but especially those areas where the human influence is minimised and nature holds sway.  The first time observing a new environment is always a great day.  Exploring Peter's Creek in Conondale National Park in Queensland was no exception. A spectacular cascade-filled stretch of creek, made all the more special by having no walking track and so not visited by many people.  Along the way was this peculiar waterfall, with ample flow falling into a hole in the solid rock and seemingly disappearing, with not even so much as a ripple appearing in the deep waterhole downstream to betray the underwater outlet which logically 'must' be there.  My map didn't indicate these falls, but I thought such an unusual feature deserved a name - And So I Called it Cauldron Falls.

 

More than just a topographical or scenic depiction, this print also speaks of my ongoing fascination with the human tendency to give things names in order to feel we understand them.  Having 'naming rights' also has a long (and often dubious) history in the relationship between people and nature and between the colonised and the colonisers.  In a playful reference to these issues, I make a habit of giving names to natural features if I don't know of one being in present use.