Category: Sketch #7: Bunurong Coast Ruminations

A collection of mixed-media ruminations reflecting on my visitation, observation and storytelling of Bunurong Coast histories.

Unity and Strength: The legacy of the Wonthaggi Miners’ Women’s Auxiliary

Posted on January 28, 2024September 5, 2024 by Rees Quilford

The Wonthaggi Miners’ Women’s Auxiliary was a plucky group of firebrand women. A trailblazing collective that delivered an amazing legacy

Trails in the Ground (installation & essay)

Posted on October 27, 2023September 1, 2024 by Rees Quilford

Articulating the idiosyncrasies and agency of the entanglement of tracks that are encrypted on every aspect of the Bunurong Coast,

Track changes: Acknowledgement of Country

Posted on September 9, 2023August 3, 2024 by Rees Quilford

[Image: Layered mixed media amalgam exploring Track Changes and the iterative ever-evolving nature of my Acknowledgement of Country] [Audio: Rees

Landscapes of Loss

Posted on September 1, 2023August 2, 2024 by Rees Quilford

Landscapes of loss Polaroid and prose speculation.

Wreck Beach’s Counter Monument

Posted on June 28, 2023October 6, 2024 by Rees Quilford

There’s this historical marker at Wreck Beach which has a couple of quirky little anecdotes. It’s the weathered bluestone cairn that can still be seen on the verge of the beach carpark but it’s also an uproarious memorial to accidental misadventure.

Remaining attuned to multiple perspectives

Posted on June 27, 2023August 1, 2024 by Rees Quilford

Attempting to remain attuned to those with cultural perspectives tracing back tens of thousands of years, to those who have

Wonthaggi’s Wartime Experience

Posted on April 23, 2023August 1, 2024 by Rees Quilford

“I would say to the House… I have nothing to offer but blood, toil, tears and sweat” was Winston Churchill’s

The Middens of Wreck Beach

Posted on July 3, 2022August 1, 2024 by Rees Quilford

I have vivid memories of the Bunurong/Boonwurrung midden sites at Wreck Beach from when I was a kid in (the mid-1980s). At that time, two different walking paths ran from the carpark through the scrub down to the beach.

Spanning cultural disjunctures

Posted on June 28, 2022August 3, 2024 by Rees Quilford

A speculative image/prose speculation of navigating cultural disjunctures on the Bunurong Coast.

Following Wonthaggi’s ‘Very Big Fish’

Posted on June 28, 2022August 4, 2024 by Rees Quilford

In 1923, a 74-foot Pygmy Blue Whale washed up dead on the Wreck Beach shoreline. A tangible reminder of the

Shadow places and greenwashing

Posted on May 20, 2022August 3, 2024 by Rees Quilford

There are numerous shadow places on the Bunurong Coast. One need look no further than the damage wrought by more

Exploring historical intimacy with Adrian

Posted on April 7, 2022September 2, 2024 by Rees Quilford

I’ve been fortunate to have experienced instances of deeply personal historical intimacy on several occasions.

154 degrees southeast

Posted on May 19, 2021June 27, 2024 by Rees Quilford

Finally, I reach my resolution, choose a desk. One angled 154 degrees southeast. One facing the backdrop for the content and landscape I interrogate.

Echoes of Jim Mc

Posted on September 30, 2020September 2, 2024 by Rees Quilford

This story about Jim McDonnell – a man who would be remembered as the last hut dweller of this coastline – could be set at many different points in his lifetime. It could be framed around the teenage Jim, a skinny cocksure kid learning the ropes underground as an apprentice on the Wonthaggi mine.

Out to the Wreck

Posted on July 3, 2020September 2, 2024 by Rees Quilford

A layered mixed-media amalgam exploring the Wreck Beach and my connections to it.

Ethel Brown: Shack Bay Matriarch

Posted on April 1, 2020September 4, 2024 by Rees Quilford

Wonthaggi resident Frank Coldabella was a regular visitor to the informal hut settlement at Shack Bay in the early-1970’s, his

Collecting Samphire with JQ

Posted on December 27, 2019September 2, 2024 by Rees Quilford

Samphire is bush tucker, a native succulent also known as sea asparagus, sea beans or swamp grass. It grows on the waterway verges across southern Australia and can be found at any number of places around these parts.

Observation exercise

Posted on October 27, 2019August 23, 2024 by Rees Quilford

Pick a road or a track, could be one that you’ve driven a thousand times before. One you’ll likely drive

The rationale for Otherwise Unrecounted

Posted on August 14, 2019August 28, 2024 by Rees Quilford

After a day spent browsing cluttered filing cabinets and listening to snippets of oral histories in the Wonthaggi Historical Society

Anticipation and anxiety

Posted on June 5, 2019August 1, 2024 by Rees Quilford

Scorching hot today, 41 degrees here in Wonthaggi. Must be roasting in the city. The museum – in the old railway station building – is surprisingly cool. Perhaps it’s the asbestos.

Splendid behaviour or passive cowardice?

Posted on February 4, 2019September 1, 2024 by Rees Quilford

News reports offered conflicting accounts of the conduct of The Artisan’s crew, the officers account reported by The Age suggested

Second swim

Posted on January 27, 2019September 2, 2024 by Rees Quilford

It’s stinking hot – 41 degrees here, 43 plus in the city. The drive from the Wonthaggi Museum to Cape Paterson’s Bay Beach is sticky and uncomfortable. I long for the cool relief of the water. It will be my second swim for the day.

Making it up as we go

Posted on April 17, 2018September 2, 2024 by Rees Quilford

I have a close personal connection to the local history museum, my grandparents – Arthur and Nell Quilford – were founding members of what has come to be known as the Wonthaggi and District Historical Society

A personal reading of the memoryscope

Posted on April 13, 2018September 1, 2024 by Rees Quilford

A mixed-media personal reading of the characteristics I have identified in Ross Gibson’s memoryscope construct.

Waiting indifferently for elaboration

Posted on February 3, 2018September 2, 2024 by Rees Quilford

Evidence of the past – whether found in the landscape itself, in archival records, in people’s memories, or somewhere else – waits indifferently for elaboration. The writing and reflections of others prompts us to question, cross-examine and elaborate on the remnants of the past.