The Gully, Katoomba, Soft Blue with Gold Mingling: The Painted River Project: Blue Mountains Rare Upland Swamps

This painting is part of a series of ten works created en plein air at Garguree (The Gully) in the Blue Mountains. Known as a place of Sweet Water, Garguree is an ecologically and culturally significant site. It forms the headwaters of Katoomba Falls (Upper Kedumba) Creek and lies within the Warragamba Catchment, which supplies water to Sydney. This work aims to capture the tension between the resilience of ecological recovery and the lasting scars of past development. As context, in 1957 Traditional Owners were forcibly removed to make way for a racetrack, built by a group of 83 local businessmen. In May 2002, Garguree was returned and declared the largest Aboriginal Place in NSW. Since then, Gundungurra Traditional Custodians, led by Aunty Sharyn and David King, have collaborated with local volunteers to restore the rare upland swamp and share the deep history of this remarkable place.