I’ve had a great time contributing to this project exploring Canberra’s urban waterways with the PhotoAccess curators and photographers: Kirsten Wehner, Wouter Van de Voorde, and Kate Matthews.
It’s part of the Rise Canberra Where You Are festival.
Water Walks brings Canberrans together – in a mindful COVID manner – to explore, document, and share experiences of our neighbourhood creeks. Participants combine with a triumvirate of artists comprising a leading local photographer, a writer (me!), and an ecologist/historian/planner on one of three guided photo-walks along Weston, Jerrabomberra, and Sullivans Creeks.
The images of the walk will create a unique public Water Walks exhibition at Manuka Arts Centre celebrating Canberra’s hidden and overlooked urban waterways.
The Water Walks exhibition will open in the Manuka Arts Centre gardens on Saturday, 29 August, 2 – 5pm, with a simultaneous launch via Facebook of PhotoAccess’ online Water Walks gallery.
All three walks were sold out (with long wait lists).
Kirsten Wehner, Creative Director of the project:
“Canberrans are – by and large – nature lovers, but I think that we don’t necessarily always feel very connected to the places right outside our front door,” Wehner muses. “We often don’t even notice them, and instead of going for a walk around the neighbourhood might instead get in the car and drive to a nature park.
“But the places right where we live – and I think particularly waterways – can tell us a lot about how our suburbs have developed. They often support a surprising variety of plants and animals and they have loads of potential for becoming places pioneering more sustainable cities. The more you know about the path right outside your front door, the more you can really see it and the more interesting it becomes.