Jo Wilmot
Works featured in Solastalgia: in the time of Covid 2020
To be Held
Digital image 2020
After loosing their home in the December 2019 fires, Cudlee Creek Artists Belinda Broughton and Ervin Janek have continued to nurture the hearts of many through their story telling in word and image. Visit https://belindabroughton.wordpress.com/
Turned from the remnant heartwood of a 25yr old Golden Wattle that once graced their bushland home, a single prayer bead holding their story in the collective consciousness. It is an offering of peace, love and protection, as all lives and landscapes in the region recover.
Before catching this moment on camera, Ervin shared his recent work, claiming the success of an image was entirely dependent on the participating model. No truer words said in this case.
Jo Wilmot
Image: Jo Wilmot
Down The Clowns
slip-cast porcelain, plant shoots 2020
“Anger is the deepest form of compassion,” says poet and philosopher David Whyte. I am wrestling like many with the complex and challenging emotions in relation to ecological loss. This was my ‘incoherent’ breaking glass moment; a product says Whyte, of my ‘physical incapacity to sustain this deep form of care’.
Roll up, roll up, to the Clown Climate Circus. Its barking mad entertainment that can’t be missed! Watch in amazement as old energy-hungry predators in their shabby arcade roll back all the environmental protections you’ve ever known! These peddlers of pandemic-powered pipe dreams are selling out the world! Lets knock ‘em all down.
‘Down the Clowns’ is a carnival ball toss game where players successfully knock down the clowns. ‘Barking mad’ references Michael Bloomberg’s tweet about New Yorkers laughing behind Trump’s back, calling him a ‘carnival barking clown’.
Jo Wilmot
Image: Jo Wilmot
Works featured in Solastalgia: an antidote at Fabrik Arts and Heritage, Lobethal 2020
Mycelium in Mind
Installation 2020
restored timber trunks, perspex mirror, string, polyclay, wire, possum pelt, match boxes, scat, leaves, paint, black light blue lighting
“This gothic staging of the mycorrhizal web that spreads beneath our feet shifts the boundaries that limit our comprehension of the interconnected nature of life above and below ground. Fungi contributes to earths carbon and nitrogen cycles facilitating inter-tree communication via mycelial networks that are often compared to the neural networks in the human brain.
Playing a vital role in the rebuilding of these fungal networks in post-fire habitats are the marsupials. Their scat re-colonises the soil with fungal spores facilitating forest regeneration.
Creating life out of death, these resilient, deterministic organisms can even clean up our toxic mess setting the scene for an ecological revolution.”
Jo Wilmot
South Coast Regional Art Centre, Goolwa 2018
Aquanimous Solution
Installation in the Holding Cell of the old Police Station 2018
galv tank, mirror, water, antique IV bottle, Hanley's River Snail (Notopala Hanleyi), LED profile light
“The changing shape and composition of waters in the lower lakes has had a ripple effect on the lives of most in this region. This biophilic response using moving water and light, taps into the innate instinct to connect natural rhythm and movement with mind, body and emotion. Embedded is a sense of longing for the healing alliances that will ensure the future of this life giving resource; the health of our rivers, lakes, estuaries, and coastal waters, and the life they support are inextricably linked. (The Murray River is no longer home to the once common Hanley's River Snail. Surviving widespread and unchanged for 150 million years, the species remains only in a few irrigation pipelines.”
Jo Wilmot
“I was deeply moved by the response of this body of artists work to our collective dilemma. I would like to speak a little of my time in the holding cell. (Installation - Aquanimous Solution) I closed the door and was alone in the dimly lit small space, with the quiet pulse of dripping water and the ripple effects reflected on the adjacent wall. The experience of my miscarriages arose as the projected image was similar to the heartbeat perceived (or not) in the first scans during pregnancy. I was then reminded of my Indigenous sisters sacred birthing site that was lost and felt the deep grief of that time. All the while, in the background, Aunty Ellen’s voice was faintly audible through the adjacent wall speaking of the loss of language and the importance of story and culture. I wondered how many Indigenous prisoners had been in this space over the years awaiting the outcome of their fate in the legal system so foreign from their own frames of reference. I thought of water and it’s use and abuse in our society and noted the complementarities of many of the artist’s voices. I am so grateful it will be a traveling exhibition with space for local artists to join in by giving their personal testament to the loss at hand in their local settings.”
Solastalgia visitor
Image: Grant Hancock
Gray Street Workshop, Adelaide 2017
Dead man’s fingers
porcelain, brass, wood 2017
“Early morning walks collecting and casting algae, seaweed and sea sponges washed up at Carpenter Rocks and Pelican Point in our states South East have felt like a last embrace. Embedded in the 'oil slick' black porcelain and brass exhaust tubes is a lament for the plight of this diverse, yet little understood ecosystem, said to be the foundation for all ecosystems on the planet. The title for the installation 'Dead mans fingers' is the common name for the Codium family of Algae. Thriving in low light and warmer waters, it is ironically one that may well survive into the future.”
Jo Wilmot
Image: Sona Sood
Last chance to see
video installation - brass tube viewer, ipad, box shelf 2017
Dead man’s fingers
neckpiece - porcelain, brass, nitrile, felt 2017
For more information on Jo’s work, visit: http://jo-wilmot.squarespace.com/