Elizabeth Colbert
Elizabeth Colbert’s art practice burgeoned following a long career in writing. It now ranges over and through many mediums—drawing, ceramics, painting, printmaking, weaving and sewing, each drawn upon to articulate an idea or concern from the complex fabric of feeling. Her art draws from many sources—aesthetic, poetic, autobiographical and philosophical. Though one of the primary themes of Colbert’s work is the fragility of things, it does resist pinning down.
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Exhibitions at Tacit include
Once Upon a Riverbank is a re-imagining of the history of the Musca Street Reserve in Balwyn North. On the surface, the reserve appears to be no more than an appealing place to walk: council-mown grass, a variety of native trees providing shade in the summer, an undulating topography with a soundscape of buffered noise from the Eastern Freeway and the Burke Rd Bridge that edge and span the reserve. Cyclists use the paved bicycle track running through it to commute to and from the city, and for leisure. Local residents walk their dogs through the seasonal changes of clusters of native trees: the acacias in June, the yellow spider flowers of the grevillea robustas between September and November, the melaleucas early summer, the callistemons in summer and autumn.
2021 Threading Through
We live on the brink of the extinction of the species; it is imminent, yet like W.B. Butler Yeats’ rough beast, it is quiescent. It exceeds our ability to imagine it and if it were already upon us, we would have no idea how to put this reality into words. But there are other means of expression, ones that are as porous, precarious and subject to rents as language. Ones that can be re-sewn, patched up and covered in signs intimating what is to come.
Elizabeth Colbert’s art practice burgeoned following a long career in writing. It now ranges over and through many mediums—drawing, ceramics, painting, printmaking, weaving and sewing, each drawn upon to articulate an idea or concern from the complex fabric of feeling. Her art draws from many sources—aesthetic, poetic, autobiographical and philosophical. Though one of the primary themes of Colbert’s work is the fragility of things, it does resist pinning down.
2019 64 Nests
Crab holes, tidal silt, mangrove pneumatophores, dark canopies, birds and people; the wetlands of Western Port Bay. These wetlands are shared with migratory wading birds such as the Eastern Curlew which flies annually to Australian shores from Siberia. However, their numbers are diminishing as the wetlands which support their flight path, such as those at Saemangeum, Korea, are drained. As humans have colonised planet Earth to meet their perceived needs, with little regard for the survival of other species, the future of many migratory wading birds has become uncertain.
64 Nests references Elizabeth Colbert’s personal sense of loss at our diminishing bird life. The wheeling flocks of birds she saw as a child are now rarely seen. It reflects her dismay at our hungry commercial disregard for the natural habitats of our planet. It also draws on the creative work of others: the selected lithographs from John Gould’s visit to Australia between 1838-40 in Sue Taylor’s John Gould’s Extinct and Endangered Birds and the poetry of the American poet, Pamela Laskin in The Bonsai Curator. But in particular, the exhibition has been informed by Colbert’s engagement with her suburban environment, remnant fabrics from her childhood home and the wetlands of Tooradin and Phillip Island.
Exhibition history
solo
2022 Once Upon a Riverbank - Tacit Art, Melbourne
2021 Threading Through - Tacit Art, Melbourne
2019 64 Nests - Tacit Art, Melbourne
2015 Once Upon a Time - Swinburne University, Melbourne
group
2023 SUBSTRATE 23 - Tacit Art, Melbourne
2022 Deakin Small Sculpture Prize - Deakin University, Melbourne
Editions Print Prize - Tacit Art, Melbourne
Scintilla - Tacit Art, Melbourne
2020 20[2020] - Tacit Art, Melbourne
2018 Works - School of Clay & Art, Melbourne
2016 Works - School of Clay & Art
2014 Works - School of Clay & Art