Embroidery artist Elaine Balla created a decorative artwork about the Camden Show in 2011 for its 125th anniversary called ‘The Camden Show. ‘
Elaine entered her embroidery work in the competitive arts and crafts section of the show and won the Champion Exhibit Ribbon.
The art of embroidery has long been popular with local women and has a history that goes back to ancient times.
What is embroidery?
Embroidery is a decorative art or craft in which the artist uses fabric and other materials to apply thread or yarn using a variety of styles and stitches.
The art of embroidery is practised worldwide and can be traced to ancient China. In medieval England, high art was controlled by guilds and used in textiles in church rituals.
Embroidery was used to tell stories and as a form of biography at a time when women had few legal rights and were mostly illiterate. It was an expression of women’s agency.
Embroidery was passed down through generations of women who were the gatekeepers of community storytelling and secrets.
Embroidery artwork ‘The Camden Show’
Elaine spoke to Camden Historical Society president Ian Willis about her artwork, ‘The Camden Show’ and her other embroidery work.
Elaine said, ‘The Camden Show work took a couple of months to complete. ‘
She said, ‘I was under pressure to do the work due to the date of the 2011 Camden Show as the deadline’.
Elaine Balla’s embroidery artwork The Camden Show, which she has donated to the Camden Historical Society (I Willis 2024)
The Camden Show work is an example of crewel embroidery using thicker thread than silk-cotton embroidery threads, with some highlights in silk and gold, e.g., the balloons.
Elaine first drew the artwork on paper and then transferred the design to the linen cloth on which the embroidery was worked.
The artwork tells the story of the Camden Show. The centrepiece is a representation of the show ring with fireworks going off behind the show rotunda.
Cattle are found in the top right-hand corner of the work, proceeding around the ring. The story then moves through the poultry pavilion to the show hall displays, including flowers, jams, cakes, and photographs.
At the bottom of the work are the entry gates. The design then moves onto the ferris wheel and other sideshow stalls, including the Dodgem cars and clowns with moving heads.
The rural exhibitors, including the tractors, other farm equipment, and the show jumping, are in the top left corner of the embroidery work.
Beneath the title are fruit and vegetable displays along with the flowers.
The embroidery is a wonderful representation of a very popular community event.
Embroidery artwork, ‘Family Story’
Another work Elaine entered at the Camden Show in 2010 was ‘Family Story’.
The work tells the story of her family, the farm, the villages of Menangle, and the town of Camden, centred on St John’s Anglican Church and St James Anglican Church.
The centre of the work shows the family farm, the house with the family’s dogs, Tiger, Suzie and Rusty.
Elaine said, ‘The work is a panorama of her life story in Menangle.’
Embroidery artist Elaine Balla with her prize-winning artwork The Family (I Willis 2024)
She finished the work over several months.
‘I completed a couple of hours every night’, she said.
In 2010, Elaine was featured in an article in the Camden press after winning the Most Outstanding Exhibit at the 2010 Camden Show with the embroidery.
The work is 140 centimetres by 55 centimetres and ‘featured over 40 years of memories’. (Camden Advertiser, 2010, ud)
‘I just wanted to have memories of where we have been. Places change. It’s really just a memory of our times,’ she said. (Macarthur Chronicle 2010)
She was ‘delighted, pleased and happy to win the prize.’ (Macarthur Chronicle, 2010)
‘I don’t really go in shows to win’. (Macarthur Chronicle, 2010)
She said, ‘If people do not enter their craftwork into the show, there won’t be a show’. (Camden Advertiser, 2010, ud)
Elaine said that she started embroidery when she was 12 years old and asked her mother if she could do an embroidery. The first work she attempted was an apple, and then she moved on to bigger projects.
Husband Steve proudly admits that Elaine put ‘a lot of effort into her work’.
Elaine and her husband Steve recently moved into Menangle’s Durham Green, downsizing from the family farm. The framed embroidery has brought many happy memories from the farm with her.
Exhibition at the Campbelltown Arts Centre
Elaine Balla is a member of the Embroiderer’s Guild of NSW, Campbelltown Group, and she was featured in a retrospective was part of the “Ruby” Exhibition of The Embroiderers Guild NSW, Campbelltown Group, at the Campbelltown Arts Centre held between 10-12 February 2023.
The image gallery below is a selection of Elaine Balla’s embroidery work at the ‘Ruby’ Exhibition at the Campbelltown Arts Centre in 2023, with images provided by Joan Kolar.
Elaine exhibited around 50 works in a variety of embroidery styles, representing 60 years of embroidery artwork.
The embroidery artworks included varying styles and pieces, including tablecloths, pictures, cushion covers and more.
The embroidery was done on linen, silk, and Madeira linen in styles including crewel, drawn-thread, pulled-thread, cross-stitch, Goldsworthy, cut-work, and more.
Elaine has exhibited her embroidery elsewhere in Australia and overseas.
The Campbelltown Group of the Embroiler’s Guild in NSW features a triennial exhibition at the Campbelltown Arts Centre.
Macarthur Chronicle 2010 ud
Reference
Elaine Balla, Interview, 4 February 2024.
Joan Kolar, Group Convenor, Embroiderers’ Guild NSW Inc., Campbelltown Group, Email, 5 February 2023.
Joan Kolar, Images from ‘Ruby’ Exhibition at Campbelltown Arts Centre, 2023.
Updated 13 February 2024. Originally posted on 11 February 2024.
Post-war housing domestic architecture in Camden is typified by a simple, cheap utilitarian building called the Camden fibro cottage.
This style of domestic architecture, the fibro cottage, can be found all over Australia and has provided a basic form of housing for thousands of families.
Modern fibro cottages in Burrawong Crescent Elderslie were built around the 1960s. (I Willis, 2005)
Yet it has been derided, rubbished, and scoffed at for decades after initially being heralded as the height of modernism in the early 20th century.
Fibro Majestic exhibition
The simple fibro house is celebrated in a new exciting exhibition at the Campbelltown Arts Centre called Fibro Majestic by renowned Australian artist and sculptor Catherine O’Donnell.
The exhibition by artist Catharine O’Donnell runs from 8 July to 13 August 2023 with free entry.
Initially conceived for the artist’s survey exhibition ‘Beyond the Shadow’ at the Orange Regional Gallery in partnership with Grafton Regional Gallery, curated by art historian Lucy Stanger in 2022.
At the centre of the exhibition is the imposing spectacle of a 75%-scale replica of a fibro house.
The exhibition promotion states:
‘Catherine O’Donnell: Fibro Majestic’ presents a body of work by O’Donnell that considers the historical and social context of fibro and social housing in Western Sydney and across Australia. O’Donnell grew up in a fibro home in Green Valley, Western Sydney, which at the time was the largest public housing estate in Sydney. The shape and form of the fibro house has long since informed her practice as she explores architecture, social history and the notions of home and memory.
Exhibition notes state that O’Donnell has taken the floor plans from the New South Wales Housing Commission around the mid-century. They are a type of modernism that has fallen out of favour with the government, the public and the building industry.
A small-scale model of a fibro cottage. Catherine O’Donnell, ‘Gold leafed house 1’, 2022. Stereolithographic model and gold leaf 13x26x30cm. Campbelltown Arts Centre, Campbelltown. (I Willis, 2023)
Complementing the main sculptural installation is a range of small housing models and intimate drawings that evoke memories of living in a fibro house.
Catherine O’Donnell, ‘Beyond the curtain beats a loving heart’, 2020. Charcoal on paper diptych, 107×50 framed. Campbelltown Arts Centre Fibro Majestic Exhibition 2023. (I Willis, 2023)
The fibro houses were more than just buildings. They sheltered people’s lives, provided a safe haven, and were a site of family celebrations, birthdays, marriages, anniversaries, and rituals. The curtains also hid many dark secrets, from domestic violence to poverty and unemployment. While there were many dysfunctional families and disrupted lives, there were many happy families with children who grew up and led successful lives.
One of the happy stories with many fond memories is the story of Fiona, who grew up in the Airds Housing Commission Estate in South Campbelltown. with its many fibro homes.
Living in Airds during the late 70s and early 80s, friendships were built, and people stuck together. It was the freedom of riding bikes with friends until the street lights came on, building makeshift cubbies and performing concerts for the neighbours.
I still remember the excitement of walking to the local shops with my sisters to buy a few groceries for Mum. The constant search for ‘bargains’ in the hope there would be twenty cents left over to buy some mixed lollies.
Ugly Australia
According to O’Donnell, fibro cottages ‘were compact, mass-produced, box-like structures’ built across Sydney’s western suburbs.
The simple fibro cottage has characterised Western Sydney and its lifestyle. The simplicity of the fibro cottage was its attraction and part of its downfall.
Typical of the urban fringe, the simple fibro cottage has been derided and ridiculed by those who are snobbish about Sydney’s outer suburbs.
The fibro cottage is typical of suburbia on the edge. The edge can be marginalised people, the urban fringe, or the perception that it is a type of housing that is unacceptable to some.
The fibro cottage represents a type of Otherness, an ugly Australia. These images have been reinforced by the Sydney press, which labelled Campbelltown an ‘ugly houso wasteland’ in 1975.
The humble fibro cottage in Camden in the 1950s and 1960s has been integral to the town’s 20th-century history. The fibro house represents the baby-boomer era, when drive-ins, Holdens, Chiko rolls, black & white TV, rock & roll, and vinyl LPs were the norm. Fibro is evocative of long summer holidays by the beach, with adolescent love, boogie boards, zinc cream and paddle pops.
This is the essence of Fibro Majestic, a metaphor for mid-century Australia.
Optimism and hope in a compact box
The fibro cottage came to the rescue in the post-war years, when Sydney experienced a housing shortage due to the ‘baby boom’ and increased immigration.
The postwar years were a period of optimism and hope for a better lifestyle. These cottages were cheap and utilitarian and could be erected quickly.
Fibro, as a building materialz, was invented at the beginning of the 20th century and imported into Australia before the First World War. Wartime restrictions resulted in the product being manufactured in Australia by the war’s end.
This is an image of a Camden fibro cottage built in 1920. Chesham Cottage is at 49 Broughton Street, Camden, built by the Camden Voluntary Workers Association following the First World War. (Camden Images)
Leaked heat like a sieve
The fibro cottages of the 1950s leaked heat like a sieve and failed by today’s energy-efficient efficiency standards for housing. According to Lloyd Nicols from the Illawarra Flame retrofit project, these cottages can be made energy efficient to make them sustainable, affordable, and attractive. The project, a joint venture between the University of Wollongong and Wollongong TAFE College, aims for kits to be able to retrofit existing fibro cottages to increase their thermal performance.
Nostalgia and memory
Nostalgia and memory are a big part of the exhibition. Artist Catherine O’Donnell states that the fibro cottage is the architecture of my childhood and an ‘everywhere-everyman example of mid-century developments across Australia’.
The old beach shacks that dominated seaside fishing villages or isolated holiday surfing spots provided low-cost accommodation for holidaymakers in often remote and low-populated settings with few services. Some of these holiday houses were owner-occupied but remained vacant outside holiday times. Most were available for short-term holiday rental. All were relatively basic.
These fibro cottages straddled the class divide and were easily accessible by the motor car by mid-century. These were egalitarian holiday experiences for Australians.
The Fibro Majestic sculptural installation attracts an audience at the Campbelltown Arts Centre, Campbelltown (I Willis 2023)
In northern New South Wales, tropes of nature, community, and heritage [around fibro cottages] have been incorporated into a new beachside ‘town’ identity.
These fantasies of bygone days play out in the Fibro Majestic exhibition, which conjures up memories of beach holidays with long lazy days lounging in the sun in a mystical past. All viewed through rose-coloured glasses misty with nostalgia.
O’Donnell maintains that these memories are ‘synonymous with Australian identity’.
Flawed Plans, a commission
In addition to the main exhibition, The Campbelltown Arts Centre has commissioned a site-specific art installation on the stairs and front wall of the gallery amphitheatre called ‘Flawed Plans’.
The Flawed Plans art installation in the forecourt of Campbelltown Arts Centre. ‘Flawed Plans’, 2023. (Campbelltown Arts Centre Amphitheatre). Vinyl, dimensions variable. Commissioned by the CAC. (I Willis, 2023)
The artwork highlights the many layers to the story of the fibro cottage and how perceptions shift and twist.
Where once the fibro house was seen as a saviour as a cheap and effective form of housing, it has become a to be seen as an urban disaster by many.
The artist maintains that as the viewer climbs around the installation, their perception shifts and skews ‘as the viewer climbs, descends or orbits the work’.
Fibro Majestic, a reflection
Fibro Majestic reminds us all how perceptions and memories change over time. Fibro houses were once the height of modernism, yet in later decades, they were derided and rubbished.
The sculptural installation at the Fibro Majestic exhibition at the Campbelltown Arts Centre, Campbelltown. ‘Fibro Majestic’, 2022. Mixed media, common household construction materials, 587x587x220cm. (I Willis, 2023)
The exhibition evokes the fibro heritage of affordable accommodation for the working man and his family in the postwar years when there was a housing shortage for ordinary people.
Fibro was a practical building material that, despite its dangers, could provide a model for the current housing crisis. The fibro cottage was a simple effective housing solution that could be reborn again.
The exhibition Fibro Majestic has captured the essence of nostalgia around this housing style. Baby boomer memories are full of fibro houses and other mid-century Australian lifestyle icons.
The art installation encapsulates the essential elements of the architectural style and is evocative of the lives of those who lived in this utilitarian style of domestic architecture.
More reading
Shaw, W. S., & Menday, L. (2013). Fibro Dreaming: Greenwashed Beach-house Development on Australia’s Coasts. Urban Studies, 50(14), 2940–2958. https://doi.org/10.1177/0042098013482507
Keep your eyes open in central Campbelltown for inspiring public art installations that brighten up dull spaces around the town.
The Campbelltown Arts Centre, in conjunction with Campbelltown City Council and the NSW Government, have a program to re-invigorate the city centre using public art.
A screenshot of the public art webpage on the website of the Campbelltown Arts Centre. Each of the seven public art projects has a dedicated webpage with detailed descriptions of the artworks, what the artist was trying to achieve and the installation specifications. (CAC, 2023)
Public art positively affects the community and people’s self-esteem, self-confidence and well-being. Campbelltown Arts Centre has created a public art website to assist people in this process and shows several murals around the Queens Street precinct.
This blog has promoted the benefits of public art in and around the Macarthur region for some time now. There are lots of interesting public artworks around the area that are hidden in plain sight. This blog has highlighted the artworks and other artefacts, memorials and monuments that promote the Cowpastures region.
The public art program of the Campbelltown Arts Centre and Campbelltown City Council is creative, innovative and inspirational. It is playful yet takes a serious approach to a contemporary problem, urban blight.
These urban planning decisions came from the 1968 Sydney Regional Outline Plan of the NSW Askin Coalition Government.
Sydney-based planning decision created tensions between Campbelltown City Council and the Macarthur Development Board around what constituted the city centre. The Queen Street precinct, supported by the council, gradually declined in importance as a retail area as newer facilities opened up.
Queen Street could not compete with the new shopping mall Macarthur Square opened in 1979 by the Hon. Paul Landa, Minister for Planning and Environment in the Wran Labor Government.
High-value-added retailing deserted the Queen Street precinct and became populated by $2-shops and op-shops.
Campbelltown’s sense of place and community identity has taken a battering in the following decades.
Reinvigoration of the Queen Street precinct
The public art program at the Campbelltown Arts Centre is trying to ameliorate the problems of the past through community engagement in art installations.
The murals would enhance the local streetscape and make the area more welcoming to residents and visitors.
“The first mural is located at one of the entrances to the CBD and will add a new element to our public domain,” Cr Greiss said.
“It’s important that works to the Queen Street precinct enhance the current amenity to build pride among residents and make the area more attractive to people visiting our city,” he said.
The mayor referred to an art installation created by Campbelltown street artist Danielle Mate ‘Raw Doings’ in Carberry Lane. The Arts Centre website states:
This vibrant and bold artwork comprises many shades of blue and purple, and is inspired by aerial views of Country and the Australian landscape.
The mural ‘Raw Doings’ by street artists Danielle Mate was commissioned by Campbelltown City Council in 2022 (Document Photography/CAC 2022)
In 2022 the Campbeltown City Council commissioned ‘Breathing Life / Bula ni Cegu / Paghinga ng Buhay’ by artists and designers Victoria Garcia and Bayvick Lawrance.
‘Breathing Life’ is a celebration of Campbelltown’s thriving Pacific community, and the extensive connections between people, plants, animals and all living things.
The mural ‘Breathing Life’ by artists Victoria Garcia and Bayvick Lawrance in 2022 and was commissioned by Campbelltown City Council (Document Photography/CAC 2022)
In 2012 Campbelltown City Council commissioned a mural board across the bus shelters at Campbelltown Railway Station supervised by Blak Douglas in Lithgow Street called ‘The Standout’. The art installation is the work of 28 artists across 70 panels with a full length of 175 metres.
The Standout pays homage to the Dharawal Dreamtime Story of the ‘Seven Eucalypts’, and Douglas’ previous photographic series of deceased gums standing alone within landscapes and casting shadows within urban facades.
The ‘Stand Out’ mural by Blak Douglas is located in Lithgow Street Campbelltown along the bus shelters outside Campbelltown Railway Station. The work was commissioned by Campbelltown City Council in 2012. (Black Douglas/CAC 2012)
The public art installation ‘Three Mobs’ by Chinese-Aboriginal artist Jason Wing was commissioned by Campbelltown City Council in 2022. The mural is located on Dumersq Street and Queen Street, the south side of the 7Eleven wall, and features a rainbow serpent as an intersection of cultures.
Aboriginal culture reveres the rainbow serpent as the creator of all things on Earth. Chinese culture understands serpents to be a symbol for luck and abundance, and a highly desired zodiac sign.
Defined as any artistic work or activity designed and created by professional arts practitioners for the public domain, Public Art may be of a temporary or permanent nature and located in or part of a public open space, building or facility, including façade elements provided by either the public or private sector (not including memorials or plaques).
Public art can….
make art an everyday experience for residents and visitors
take many forms in many different materials and styles, such as lighting, sculpture, performance and artwork
be free-standing work or integrated into the fabric of buildings, streetscapes and outdoor spaces
draw its meaning from or add to the meaning of a particular site or place.
Public art humanizes the built environment and invigorates public spaces. It provides an intersection between past, present and future, between disciplines, and between ideas.
The paper maintains that public art has the potential to reinvigorate public spaces and add to their vibrancy. It states:
Throughout history, public art can be an essential element when a municipality wishes to progress economically and to be viable to its current and prospective citizens. Data strongly indicates that cities with an active and dynamic cultural scene are more attractive to individuals and business.
The statue of Elizabeth Macquarie by artist Tom Bass in Mawson Park in the Campbelltown CBD on Queen Street. The statue was commissioned by Campbelltown & Airds Historical Society in 2006 and cost $75,000. (Wikimedia)
Public art can express community values, enhance our environment, transform a landscape, heighten our awareness, or question our assumptions. Placed in public sites, this art is there for everyone, a form of collective community expression. Public art is a reflection of how we see the world – the artist’s response to our time and place combined with our own sense of who we are.
associationforpublicart.org/what-is-public-art/
Public art can be found in the most unusual places. In this case, this is a statue of a boy at Emerald Hills Shopping Centre Leppington. The statue memorialises the St Andrews Boys Home that once was located on the Emerald Hills land release site. (I Willis 2021)
To continue the story of Campbelltown, this is an excellent overview by local author Jeff McGill with many fascinating images of past and present times. (Kingsclear Publication, 2017)
Updated 17 May 2023. Originally posted on 16 May 2023 as ‘Public art at Campbellton brightens up a dull space’.
The Cowpastures was a vague area south of the Nepean River floodplain on the southern edge of Sydney’s Cumberland Plain.
The Dharawal Indigenous people who managed the area were sidelined in 1796 by Europeans when Governor Hunter named the ‘Cow Pasture Plains’ in his sketch map. He had visited the area the previous year to witness the escaped ‘wild cattle’ from the Sydney settlement, which occupied the verdant countryside. In 1798 Hunter used the location name ‘Cow Pasture’; after this, other variants have included ‘Cow Pastures’, ‘Cowpasture’ and ‘Cowpastures’. The latter will be used here.
John Hunter, Second Governor of New South Wales 1795-1800 and Royal Navy Officer (Wikimedia)
Governor King secured the area from poaching in 1803 by creating a government reserve, while settler colonialism was furthered by allocating the first land grants in 1805 to John Macarthur and Walter Davidson. The Cowpastures became the colonial frontier, and the dispossession and displacement of Indigenous people inevitably led to conflict and violence. The self-styled gentry acquired territory by grant and purchase and created a regional landscape of pseudo-English pastoral estates.
This is a portrait of Governor Phillip Gidley King, the third governor of the British colony of New South Wales from 1800-1806. He saw service in the British Navy with the rank of captain. (SLNSW)
Collective memories
According to Kate Darian-Smith and Paula Hamilton, collective memories are ‘all around us in the language, action and material culture of our everyday life’,[1] and I often wondered why the cultural material representative of the Cowpastures appeared to have been ‘forgotten’ by our community.
The list of cultural items is quite an extensive include: roads and bridges, parks and reserves; historic sites, books, paintings, articles; conferences, seminars, and workshops; monuments, memorials and murals; community commemorations, celebrations and anniversaries.
Material culture
This material culture represents the multi-layered nature of the Cowpastures story for different actors who have interpreted events differently over time. These actors include government, community organisations, storytellers, descendants of the Indigenous Dharawal and European colonial settlers, and local and family historians. Using two case studies will illustrate the contested nature of the Cowpastures memory narrative.
Case Studies
1995 Cowpastures Bicentennial
Firstly, the 1995 Cowpastures Bicentennial celebrated the finding of the ‘wild cattle’ that escaped from the Sydney settlement by a party led by Governor Hunter in 1795.
Following the success of the 1988 Australian Bicentenary and the publication of histories of Camden and Campbelltown,[2] local officialdom decided that the anniversary of finding the ‘wild cattle’ deserved greater recognition. Camden Mayor HR Brooking stated that the festival events’ highlight the historic and scenic significance of the area’. A bicentenary committee of local dignitaries was formed, including the governor of New South Wales as a patron, with representatives from local government, universities, and community organisations.
In the end, only 10% of all festival events were directly related to the history of the Cowpastures. Golf tournaments, cycle races and music concerts were rebadged and marketed as bicentenary events, while Indigenous participation was limited to a few lines in the official programme and bicentennial documentation.[3] The legacy of the bicentenary is limited to records in the Camden Museum archives, a quilt, a statue, a park and a book.
The Camden Quilters commissioned a ‘story quilt’ told through the lens of local women, who took a holistic approach to the Cowpastures story. It was the only memorial created by women, and the collaborative efforts of the quilters created a significant piece of public art. Through the use of applique panels, the women sewed representations of the Cowpastures around the themes of Indigenous people, flora and fauna, ‘wild cattle’, agriculture, roads and bridges, and settlement.[4] The quilt currently hangs in the Camden Library.
A postcard produced in 1995 at the time of the Cowpastures Bicentennial of the Cowpastures Quilt produced by the Camden Quilters. (1995, Camden Museum)
Statue of Governor Hunter
In the suburb of Mount Annan, there is a statue of Governor Hunter. The land developer AV Jennings commissioned Lithgow sculptor and artist Antony Symons to construct the work to coincide with a residential land release. The statue has a circular colonnade, supporting artworks with motifs depicting cows, settlement, and farming activities.
According to Alison Atkinson-Phillips, three trends in memorial commemoration have been identified since the 1960s, and Hunter’s statue is an example of a ‘representative commemoration’ – commemorating events from the past.
The statue of Governor Hunter in the suburb of Mount Annan. Land developer AV Jennings commissioned Lithgow sculptor and artist Antony Symons (1942-2018) in 1995 to construct the work. Officially opened by the Mayor of Camden, Councillor FH Brooking, on the 6th April 1995. (I Willis, 2022)
Two other types of memorialisation identified by Atkinson-Phillips have been ‘participatory memorialisation’ instigated by ‘memory activists’ and place-based memorials placed as close as possible to an event.[5]
On the northern approach to the Camden town centre is the Cowpastures Reserve, a parkland used for passive and active recreation. The reserve was opened by the Governor of NSW on 19 February 1995 and is located within the 1803 government reserve, although the memorial plaque states that it is ‘celebrating 100 years of Rotary’.
The NSW Department of Agriculture published Denis Gregory’s Camden Park Birthplace of Australia’s Agriculture in time for the bicentenary. The book covered ‘200 years of the Macarthur dynasty’. It demonstrated the ‘vision and determination’ of John and Elizabeth Macarthur to make ‘the most significant contribution to agricultural development in the history of Australia’. Landscape artist Greg Turner illustrated the work with little acknowledgement of prior occupation by the Dharawal people.[6]
Commemoration of the 1816 Appin Massacre
Secondly, commemorating the 1816 Appin Massacre has created a series of memorials. The massacre represents a more meaningful representation of the Cowpastures story with the loss of Indigenous lives to the violence of the Cowpastures’ colonial frontier. The commemoration of these events is part of Atkinson-Phillip’s ‘participatory memorialisation’ and includes a place-based memorial.
European occupation of the Cowpastures led to conflict, and this peaked on 17 April 1816 when Governor Macquarie ordered a reprisal military raid against Aboriginal people. Soldiers under the command of Captain James Wallis shot at and drove Aboriginal people over the cliff at Cataract Gorge, killing around 14 men, women and children[7] on the eastern limits of the Cowpastures.
Governor Macquarie (SLNSW)
The Winga Myamly Reconciliation Group organised a memorial service for the Appin Massacre in April 2005 at the Cataract Dam picnic area.[8] By 2009 the yearly commemorative ceremony attracted the official participation of over 150 people, both ‘Indigenous and Non-Indigenous’. Attendees included the NSW Minister for Aboriginal Affairs and representatives from Wollondilly Shire Council and the NSW Police.[9]
In 2007 Wollondilly Shire Council and the Reconciliation Group commissioned a commemorative plaque at the picnic area. According to Atkinson-Phillips, plaques are often overlooked and analysing the words gains insight into the intent of those installing them.[10] The inscription on the Cataract memorial plaque leaves no doubt what the council and the reconciliation group wanted to emphasise, and it states:
The massacre of men, women and children of the Dharawal Nation occurred near here on 17 April 1816. Fourteen were counted this day, but the actual number will never be known. We acknowledge the impact this had and continues to have on the Aboriginal people of this land. We are deeply sorry. We will remember them. Winga Mayamly Reconciliation Group. Sponsored by Wollondilly Shire Council.
The plaque at the Cataract Dam picnic area. The memorial was placed at the picnic area in 2007, jointly organised by Winga Myamly Reconciliation Group and Wollondilly Shire Council, following the memorial service started in 2005 by the Reconciliation Group. (Monuments Australia, 2010)
In 2016 the Campbelltown Arts Centre held an art exhibition with an international flavour commemorating the bicentenary of the Appin Massacre called With Secrecy and Dispatch. The gallery commissioned new works from ‘six Aboriginal Australian artists and four First Nation Canadian artists’ that illustrated ‘the shared brutalities’ of the colonial frontier for both nations.[11]
Appin Massacre Cultural Landscape
In 2021 an application was made to Heritage NSW for consideration of the Appin Massacre Cultural Landscape, the site of the 1816 Appin Massacre, for listing on the State Heritage Register. The Heritage NSW website states that the Appin Massacre was ‘one of the most devastating massacre events of First Nations people in the history of NSW’. It is ‘representative of the complex relationships between First Nations people and settlers on the colonial frontier’.[12]
In conclusion, these two case studies briefly highlight how the contested meaning of memorials commemorating aspects of the Cowpastures story varies for different actors over time. At the 1995 bicentenary, only European voices were heard telling the Cowpastures story emphasising the cattle, Governor Hunter, and settlement.
Voices of Indigenous Australians
In recent years the voices of Indigenous Australians have been heard telling a different story of European occupation emphasising the dire consequences of the violence on the colonial frontier in the Sydney wars.[13]
Endnotes
[1] Kate Darian-Smith & Paula Hamilton (eds), Memory and History in the Twentieth-Century Australia. Melbourne, Oxford, 1994, p 4.
[2] Alan Atkinson, Camden, Farm and Village Life in Early New South Wales. Melbourne, Oxford, 1988. Carol Liston, Campbelltown, The Bicentennial History. Sydney, Allen & Unwin, 1988.
[3]Cowpastures Review and 1995 Calendar, Bicentennial Edition. Vol 1, 1995, p3
[4]Cowpastures Review and 1995 Calendar, Bicentennial Edition. Vol 1, 1995, p2
[5] Alison Atkinson-Phillips, ‘The Power of Place: Monuments and Memory’ in Paul Ashton & Paula Hamilton (eds), The Australian History Industry. North Melbourne, Australian Scholarly Publishing, 2022, p.126.
[6] Turner, Greg. & Gregory, Denis. & NSW Agriculture, Camden Park, birthplace of Australia’s agriculture. Orange, NSW, NSW Agriculture, 1992.
[10] Alison Atkinson-Phillips, ‘The Power of Place: Monuments and Memory’ in Paul Ashton & Paula Hamilton (eds), The Australian History Industry. North Melbourne, Australian Scholarly Publishing, 2022, p.127.
Camden realism is a style of art that has appeared in the Macarthur region in recent decades and tells the story of the local area. It was recently on display at the Campbelltown Arts Centre, where the gallery mounted an exhibition displaying the works of Nola Tegel, Patricia Johnson and others.
a group of artists who follow the same style, share the same teachers, or have the same aims. They are typically linked to a single location.
Local artists Nola Tegel and Patricia Johnson follow a representational style of work pioneered in the local area from the 1970s by artist Alan Baker. Tegel and Johnson were some of Baker’s students who, joined by others, and have created an impressive and vital body of local artwork.
The followers of Camden realism conduct a form of storytelling through their representational style of artwork that documents the ever-changing landscape of the Macarthur region and its cultural heritage.
Campbelltown Arts Centre
Camden realism is regularly exhibited at the Campbelltown Arts Centre and the annual Camden Art Prize.
In 2020 Tegel was commissioned by the Campbelltown Arts Centre to
develop a series of paintings that capture glimpses of Campbelltown’s history amongst an ever-changing landscape.
Then & Now Catalogue
The Campbelltown Arts Centre mounted these works in an exhibition called ‘Then and Now‘, which ran from March to May 2021.
The Campbelltown Arts Centre was established in 2005 and boasts that it is a regional creative hub. The gallery encourages local artists to take risks using various techniques from new to traditional, including Baker’s representational style of realism.
The Tegel commission
The brief for the Tegel commission stated that she
‘develop a series of paintings that capture glimpses of Campbelltown’s history amongst an ever-changing landscape’.
Storytelling is the essence of Tegel’s artwork, and the exhibition catalogue states her body of artwork has documented
‘the built environment and landscape of the Campbelltown CBD ahead of imminent growth and continuous change’.
Storytelling is an essential element of the creative process, and artist Courtney Jordon argues that:
Storytelling often comes naturally to artists. Sometimes the story starts on a single canvas or sheet of paper and doesn’t end until a gallery full of paintings, a suite of drawings, a set of illustrations, a series of comic strips or an entire graphic novel. Certain subject matters compel an artist to revisit them again and again, building on a concept or pushing it in different directions. The narrative can be a visible part of the artwork in the form of a written story. But oftentimes, it acts as an invisible framework that guides an artist through the creative process.
Tegel is a storyteller and she has created a narrative that fulfilled the commission brief with empathy and vision. This was based on her understanding of the area’s sense of place and community identity as a growing community on Sydney’s urban fringe. The exhibition catalogue states that
Tegel’s accomplished documentation of Campbelltown captures the artists’ attachment to familiar outlooks and awe of the growing community.
‘Then and Now’, Exhibition catalogue
The catalogue cover of the Nola Tegel Exhibition Then & Now at the Campbelltown Arts Centre in 2021 (I Willis)
The essence of Tegel’s artwork is storytelling as she gives a visual palette to the aspirations and expectations of the local community of local’s and new arrivals by capturing the meaning and essence of place on the canvas.
Sydney’s urban fringe is a zone of transition where hope and loss, and dreams and memories are shaped and re-shaped by a shifting sea of urbanisation. Tegel has produced a body of work that tells the story of subtle nuances across the landscape that are only understood by those who have experienced them. She reminds us all that the border between the rural and the urban fringe is a constantly shifting feast.
Campbelltown is a landscape of change as it has been since the area was proclaimed by Governor Macquarie in 1820. Initially, as a settler society dispossessing the Dharawal of their country, and in the 20th century, urban dwellers dispossessing Europeans of their bucolic countryside.
Tegel has witnessed these challenges through her interpretation of the area’s cultural landscapes in an evocative fashion, and in the process, captured Campbelltown’s sense of place.
Visitors at the Exhibition Then & Now for Macarthur artist Nola Tegel at the Campbelltown Arts Centre in 2021 (I Willis)
The notes in the exhibition catalogue argue that Tegel has drawn here artistic influences from various sources. Amongst these have been working with artist Barbara Romalis and being a foundational member of artist Alan Baker’s art classes at Camden.
Camden realism and Alan Baker
Baker created what might be called the Camden Realist School of art. He was a follower of the Realist tradition and shunned sentimentalism, modernist abstract and avant-garde styles.
Baker’s influence on Tegel is evident in the ‘Then and Now’ exhibition collection, where it is represented by her ability to capture Campbelltown’s sense of place without sentimentalism or abstraction.
In the 1970s Baker encouraged a realist style amongst students at his Camden Public School art classes, which included Nola Tegel, Patricia Johnston, Olive McAleer, Rizwana Ahmad, and Shirley Rorke.
Baker encouraged a Plein Air painting style, a tradition that
goes back to the French Impressionists in the mid-19th century by introducing paints in tubes. Before this, artists made their own paints by grinding and mixing dry pigments powder with linseed oils.
In Australia the school of Heidelberg School of artists regularly painted landscapes en plein air, and sought to depict daily life from the 1890s.
Tegel displayed her deft skills as a practitioner of this style in her 2019 Maitland Regional Art Gallery exhibition called ‘In the Light of the Day’. Her artworks were described as coming
from a long standing tradition of painting en plein air, artwork created ‘in the moment’, painted and worked on in situ.
In 2018 Tegel documented the historic colonial Victorian homestead Maryland at Bringelly when she was privately commissioned ‘to create 60 paintings.’ These paintings have told the story of one of the Cowpastures most important colonial mansions and farms built between 1820 and 1850. (Then & Now Catalogue)
Patricia Johnston
Another member of the Camden Realist school is Camden-based artist Patricia Johnston.
Another prodigy of Alan Baker and a fan of the plein air tradition Johnston says that Baker
Revealed the challenge of capturing changing light conditions in open-air painting. The immediacy of this technique and the ability to analyse complex visual scenes established a groundwork that has greatly influenced my painting. The environment became by studio.
Friends Annual & Focus Exhibition Catalogue 2021
A collage of paintings by artist Patricia Johnson on display at the Campbelltown Arts Centre as the ‘2021 Focus Artist’ in the ‘Friends Annual and Focus Exhibition’. (I Willis)
Realism on display
Camden realism’s outstanding body of work is a collection of Alan Baker’s paintings, sketches, and other works at the Alan Baker Art Gallery Macaria in John Street Camden. The gallery presents the Alan Baker Collection, which is
a colourful portrayal of an artist’s life in 21st Century Australia.
Alan Baker Art Gallery Flyer
The flyer for the ‘Face to Face’ Exhibition at the Alan Baker Art Gallery Macaria Camden with artist Alan Baker’s self-portrait on the cover. The exhibition is running during 2021. (Alan Baker Art Gallery)
Camden realism is encouraged every year in the Camden Art Prize, which was established in 1975. The acquisitive art prize has a host of categories attracting a mix of artist styles, including traditional representational works.
Smaller exhibitions of Camden realism add to body of work. In 2019 local artists Patricia Johnson, Nola Tegel, Bob Gurney, and Roger Percy mounted an exhibition at Camden Library called ‘Living Waters of Macarthur’. The body of artworks told a variety of stories of the local area in a visual form and captured the essence of place for viewers of local landscapes.
Art as storytelling
The body of work that has grown around Camden realism illustrates the ability of art to tell a story about place. The art style encourages a sense of emotional attachment to a locality by telling stories about the landscapes that surround the community.
Camden realism offers a visual interpretation of storytelling of Macarthur landscapes and the communities within it. This body of work documents the changes that have taken place across the local area from pre-European times to the present, illustrating that all these landscapes are transitional.
Perhaps leaving the last word to artist Courtney Jordon, who says:
Even if they are not aware of it, visual artists often develop some sort of narrative in their work..
Camden realism is a school of art that documents the local area in a different form of storytelling.
Gardens are practical, places of beauty, peaceful, have a pleasing aesthetic and are popular with people. Gardens across the Macarthur region certainly fulfil these elements.
The gardens that have graced this mortal Eden of ours are the best evidence of humanity’s reason for being on Earth. History without gardens would be a wasteland.
Humans have long turned to gardens—both real and imaginary—for sanctuary from the frenzy and tumult that surrounds them.
Harrison maintains that people wander through many types of gardens:
Real, mythical, historical, literary.
The display of spring wisteria in the gardens at Camden Park House. The gardens are open in spring every year and are a magnificent display of vibrant colours. The gardens are part of the September Open Weekend at the property which provides one of the important intact colonial Victorian gardens in Australia. This image was taken by Lyn Forbes on the 2018 Open Weekend. (L Forbes, 2018)
Many say that gardens and connectedness to nature contribute to wellness
Wellness and wellbeing
Wellness is an area of growing public interest and is one the most popular sections of bookshops. A simple Google search of wellness reveals over 700 million search results.
The term biophilia was introduced by Edward O Wilson in his 1984 book Biophilia where he defined it as ‘”the urge to affiliate with other forms of life”.[3]
These ideas are not new and in ancient Greek mythology Gaia is the ancestral mother of all life and the personification of the Earth: the primal Mother Earth goddess.
In 1979 James Lovelock, in Gaia: A New Look at Life on Earth; his Gaia hypothesis which sees the Earth as a self-supporting organism.
Gardening has many of these elements and a direct connection to the earth.
One active gardener maintains that this garden provides
therapy time, social interaction with other like-minded people and the satisfaction of growing your own produce. It is very peaceful down there and there is something about digging in the earth. It is fulfilling and a sense of joy seeing something grow from seed. There’s nothing like being able to pick and eat your own produce. The wide variety of colours of the flowers and vegetables in the garden builds mindfulness.
This is a park with varied places to wander through and enjoy, roses in abundance, opportunities for parties, weddings or friends, and 2 palm trees at one of the gates planted by Elizabeth Macarthur to add to the history!! Very pleasurable. (Val S, Camden)
A two minute stroll from the gorgeous township of Camden and you’ll find this little hidden gem. Beautifully maintained gardens in a tranquil setting make this spot just perfect for a short retreat from the rest of the world. no bustle, no shops no noise (except the occasional church bells), just peace and tranquility. (PThommo101, Camden)
I just loved the park with its wonderful rose garden and beautiful arbor. I was there to do a photo shoot and this park never fails to impress with its beautiful shadows and views (CamdenNSW)
Camden’s Macarthur Park endowed to the residents of Camden by Sibella Macarthur Onslow in the early 20th century (I Willis, 2016)
A beautiful, restful place to take a Sunday stroll. Any time of the year there is always something on offer, but spring time is especially lovely. (Sue H, Sydney)
It was wonderful to spend time here at the beginning of spring, (Matt H, Penang, Malaysia)
What a beautiful place for a picnic….the grounds are extensive and have an impressive display of Australian native plants….wattles, grevillea ,bottlebrush and eucalypts, to name but a few. (Lynpatch29, Sydney)
I was very impressed it is beautiful (Camden NSW)
A tranquil space for a walk among native plants. Your head is back in a good space. (Susie994, Canberra)
The Australian Botanic Gardens at Mount Annan showing a bed of paper daisies 2016 (ABG)
Maybe it is the walking around the picturesque landscape provided by the WSU grounds staff and gardeners. Maybe it is the landscape gardening and native vegetation set off by the water features. Maybe it is the quiet and solitude in the middle of a busy Campbelltown.
Whatever it is in the sculpture garden, whether provided by the permanent WSU sculpture collection or the exhibition works, the site has a positive serenity that is hard to escape. It certainly attracts the staff and students.
The sculpture garden in the grounds of Western Sydney University Campbelltown are one of the best kept secrets of the Macarthur region. It is great to see the display of public art and there a host of display pieces to hold the interest of any art nerd. (IWillis)
The Japanese Gardens are a special gift from Koshigaya, Campbelltown’s Sister City in Japan, and are located in the grounds of the Campbelltown Arts Centre.
The Campbelltown Japanese Gardens celebrate the sister city relationship between Campbelltown and Koshigaya. The gardens were presented to Campbelltown by the citizens of Koshigaya on 10 April, 1988.
The Gardens symbolise the beliefs and religion of both Shinto, the indigenous religion of Japan, and Zen Buddhism.
The Campbelltown Japanese Gardens feature a traditional waterfall, koi pond, timber bridge, stonework pathways, lush plantings and a 16th Century designed teahouse, hand crafted by Japanese craftsmen.
The aim of the garden is to obtain quiet solitude. The design represents elegant simplicity, lending itself to contemplation and heightened awareness. (Campbelltown Arts Centre)
The Japanese Garden at the Campbelltown Arts Centre. The garden illustrates the ‘peaceful surrounds and tranquility of the traditional Japanese plants, designs and craftsmanship’. (CAC)
The Picton Botanical Gardens 2017. The gardens were established in 1986 and covers 4.1 ha and has 90% native Australian plantings. (Pinterest)
Tripadvisor
The gardens are beautiful. (TamJel, North Sydney)
Well presented, peaceful park just what the doctor ordered.. (Gasmi, Sydney)
Purely by chance, I saw a signpost for the Picton Botanical Gardens. I drove down Regreme Road and discovered a beautiful, peaceful space adjacent to the oval. (Jennifer C, Belconnen, ACT)
The Macarthur Centre for Sustainable Living garden ‘The Centre is a not-for-profit, community-driven organisation supported by local Macarthur Councils and the Royal Botanic Gardens & Domain Trust. MCSL is primarily an educational facility and model for sustainable technology’ (2017 MCSL)
The Camden RSL Memorial Rose Garden is the site of the annual Anzac Day Dawn Service in Camden. It attracts thousands of people each year and is a site of memory and commemoration. The extensive rose garden has a memorial obelisk located in front of a columbarium. (CRSL, 2017)
The Camden Rotary Cowpasture Reserve garden in spring 2018. The reserve wall was opened and dedicated on 19 February 1995 by Rear Admiral Peter Sinclair Governor NSW. The monument celebrates the Rotary Centenary and the service that Camden Rotary has provided to the community since 1947. (2018 I Willis)
Campbelltown Arts Centre continues its growing reputation for innovative, exciting and challenging art.
Sheer Fantasy Experience is an innovating and challenging art exhibition at the Campbelltown Arts Centre 2018 (I Willis)
The Campbelltown Arts Centre hosted the opening of a whimsical exhibition curated by artist David Capra in April 2018.
Curator David Capra at the launch of his exhibition Sheer Fantasy at the Campbelltown Arts Centre April 2018 (I Willis)
Within the exhibition fantasies abound in a world of the imagination where the world is re-interpreted by indulgence.
Launch of the Sheer Fantasy Exhibition at the Campbelltown Arts Centre April 2018 (I Willis)
The exhibition notes state there are:
A number of newly commissioned works in which artists have contemplated private and internal landscapes that have long influenced their practices…bold architectural additions… provide an immersive experience of constructed escapisms that are stongly familiar…
Launch of the Sheer Fantasy Exhibition at the Campbelltown Arts Centre April 2018 (I Willis)
Influences include Hollywood Westerns movie sets and the Golden Age of Cinema. Combined with performance art by Renny Kodgers in a truck where there are ‘slow conversations’.
The crowd at the launch of Sheer Fantasy Exhibition at the Campbelltown Arts Centre April 2018 (I Willis)
An interesting and challenging display.
Launch of the Sheer Fantasy Exhibition at the Campbelltown Arts Centre April 2018 (I Willis)
The CHN blogger was out and about at Campbelltown Arts Centre recently on a Friday night at the opening of the 2017 Fisher’s Ghost Art Award.
A packed Campbelltown Arts Centre was filled with keen supporters of the award. They walked around and viewed the art works that had survived the culling process and made it onto the walls and displays.
There was quite a crowd the Campbelltown Arts Centre for the opening night of the 2017 Fisher’s Ghost Art Award on Friday 4 November.
55 Years of History
2017 is the 55th year of the prize and the finalists had some pretty stiff competition.
There were a diverse range of works. The categories include Open, Contemporary, Traditional, Sculpture, Photography, Primary Students, Secondary Students, Surrealism, Macarthur award for a local artist, Aboriginal, Mentorship Macability award for a work by an artist with a disability.
The Award has a total prize pool of $38000 supported by a range of local sponsors.
Campbelltown Arts Centre is well regarded art institution in the Sydney area under the leadership of director Michael Dagostino.
Camden artist survives cull at the Award
One entrant at this year’s award was Camden artist Sandra Dodds. She survived the cull with her sculpture work Eclipse.
Camden artist Sandra Dodds with her entry Eclipse in the sculpture category of the 2017 Fisher’s Ghost Art Award on the opening night of Friday 4 November. (I Willis)
Bringelly artist Brian Stratton had his work Shoalhaven Tapestry hung in the Traditional category.
Brian Stratton and his watercolour ‘Shoalhaven Tapestry’ hung at the 2017 Fisher’s Ghost Art Award at Campbelltown Arts Centre (L Stratton)
Brian said about his painting:
‘One of my watercolour paintings of Crookhaven Heads on the south coast of NSW. Over the past three decades I would have painted more than 200 paintings of the north face of this headland. To me this work has more of a feeling of a tapestry, as opposed to a watercolour; hence its title.’
Award proceedings
The proceedings on the opening night got under way just after 6.00pm with the official announcements around 7.30pm. The announcement of the winners was introduced by a welcome to country by a local Dharawal elder.
The 2017 judges were curator Tess Allas, artist Dr Daniel Mudie Cunningham and artist Ben Quilty.
The art award is part of the Fisher’s Ghost Festival which is held in November each year and started in 1956. The festival is named after the local 19th century legend of Fisher’s ghost.
In 2017 the carnival was held on Bradbury Oval and was in full swing as the art award winners were announced at the art centre.
The street parade moves along Queen Street and has a variety of community, sporting and business groups with floats and novelties.
Each year the festival has a theme and in the past they have included The Ghost with the Most, The Spirit of Campbelltown, the International Year of the Volunteers, the Centenary of Federation, the National Year of Reading and most recently, the 30th anniversary of the Campbelltown-Koshigaya Sister City relationship.
The Miss Festival Quest, which ran up until the early 90s, was adapted to form The Miss Princess Quest, which has now been running for more than two decades.
Campbelltown Art Centre forecourt on the opening night of the 2017 Fisher’s Ghost Art Award (I Willis)
The story of the ghost of Fred Fisher
The festival is based around the story of the ghost of Fred Fisher.
The ghost story of Fred Fisher is part of Australian gothic literature and the country’s colonial past. These stories make a statement about the white Australian psyche and the monster within. The landscape is portrayed as a monster in the genry of Australian gothic now and in the past when the early colonials viewed the bush as evil and threatening.
The National Library of Australia outlines the story of Fred Fisher and the songs, stories and legends that flow from it. They claim that it is the most forgotten ghost story in Australia..
![Camden Community Gardens[1]](https://camdenhistorynotes.files.wordpress.com/2018/03/camden-community-gardens1.jpg)
Camden History Notes 
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