The Art for Trees Project: BOTTLES FOR SALE AT BOTANIC GARDENS

The Art For Trees Project

On the 20th November 1769 Captain Cook ventured up the Waihou River, named by him that day the Thames. His journal entry tells of “ lofty trees which adorne its banks....” and a tree he measured “that girted 19 feet 8 inches 6 feet above the ground….its length from the root to the first branch to be 89 feet…as straight as an arrow…"
( J.C Beaglehole, 1955).
His companion Joseph Banks described ...the finest timber my eyes ever beheld ….thick woods of it were everywhere upon the Banks, every tree as straight as a pine and of immense size…... (J.C Beaglehole,1962)

Today, if you were to follow in Cook’s wake up the river Waihou, your gaze would be met not with magnificent native swamp forest, but acid green dairy pasture stretching away between stop banks and macrocarpa shelter belts. Of the vanished giant Kahikatea there remains only a few scrappy fragments.

The Art for Trees Project pays homage to what Cook saw that day in 1769. To the giant tree he measured not far from the spot he went ashore. The artist, Fiona Garlick, has made a forest of 400 ceramic bottles representing some of the native trees and shrubs which once adorned the banks of the Waihou, and which have been displaced by the introduced species associated with farming.

YOU BUY A BOTTLE ..... A TREE WILL BE PLANTED

For every bottle sold, a tree will be planted across the river from Cook’s Landing site. This restorative planting program will take place in partnership with Environment Waikato with the aim of establishing an area of self sustaining native wetlands.

When will planting take place?
Planting date confirmed for Saturday 25th July 2009.

Where?
At Ferry Road Pond, on the banks of the Waihou River near where State Highway 2 meets Hauraki Road. See map.

What will be planted?
Seedlings of the plants and shrubs represented by the artwork plus many more varieties that will help to establish the complex wetlands ecosystem.

Sunday, January 3, 2010

BOTTLES FOR SALE AT BOTANIC GARDENS

Hey there, just to let any interested parties know... the remainder of my bottles are exhibited and on sale at Stoneleigh Sculpture in the Gardens at the Auckland Botanic Gardens in Manukau. See the link www.aucklandbotanicgardens.co.nz/stoneleigh-sculpture-in-the-gardens/. You will also be able to see my latest outdoor sculpture "Skipping Stone" exhibited in the gardens and a wonderful show of small scale sculptural objects in bronze by NZ artists called "Garden of Delights" in which I have four w0rks. I anticipate doing another planting for the Art for Trees Projects in autumn this year. Tree girl