Practical Gardening for Amateurs: Pear Tree 1, Hillston: Gardens: Fragments of Life and Loss

Gardening books date back to antiquity and have gradually evolved from practical manuals into richly illustrated guides and philosophical reflections on nature—tracing shifts in taste, technology, and cultural values over time. Pear Tree 1, Hillston is part of a series of fifteen works titled Practical Gardening for Amateurs, inspired by A.G.L. Heyller’s 1937 book of the same name. Each piece in the series is created directly onto a page cut from the original publication, forming a pictorial response to both my garden in Springwood and the specific design and written content of the chosen page. The intention behind each work is to build a time-based visual narrative that bridges the historical and the personal, linking past and present while exploring the overarching themes of memory, fragmentation, life and loss.

This painting is from the exhibition and publication, Gardens: Fragments of Life and Loss – an artistic enquiry that systematically explores themes of memory, impermanence, and transformation through the motif of the garden. Drawing upon visual language and observational practices, the body of work investigates how natural environments serve as metaphors for human experience, particularly in relation to loss and regeneration. The paintings communicate knowledge by documenting and interpreting the cyclical processes of change and adaptation in nature, offering insights into how landscapes reflect emotional and cultural memory. This body of work contributes to interdisciplinary dialogues between art, ecology, and the human condition through a methodical engagement with site, material, and temporality.