Our Island, Our Sea - an ocean away

ReDot Fine Art Gallery is extremely honoured to be hosting the first ever international show by the community art centre known as Erub Arts, which has become famous for their production of Ghost Net sculptures and artefacts made from debris collected from the oceans around Darnley Island.

Erub rises sharply from the au karem (deep sea) in the eastern Torres Strait, and their daily life is governed by the rhythms of the ocean and the seasons. As one of Australia’s most remote art centres, located in the outer eastern islands of the Torres Strait, Erub Art’s success is based on the cultural integrity and collaborative practice, which is deeply rooted in cultural traditions/stories and performance.

This ongoing theme of the ocean has led to much of the art centres current work reflecting the fragility of life and connection to this ocean, using the derelict drifting fishing net known as "Ghost Net" as the perfect and primary medium to tell this story and create their art.

Erub Arts started making Ghost Net artworks in 2010 with an initial workshop by Sue Ryan from Ghost Net Australia and then subsequently under the artistic direction of Lynnette Griffiths it has blossomed, going on to make more ambitious large scale sculptures and installations and their success has been nothing short of meteoric.

’Our Island, Our Sea – an ocean away’, will be a collection of over 40 works, crafted by 16 artists, that will travel to Singapore for the community to educate, engage and stun their international audience. A variety of skills and techniques will be showcased via the 3D sculptural installations that are making Erub Arts one of the hottest commodities in the Australian art scene at the moment.

Widely collected by institutional organisations, from the British Museum, London to the National Gallery of Victoria (NGV), Melbourne this is the first opportunity to see their magical weaving and stitching in an installation setting where predominately marine life will mingle and cohabit from the ceilings of the gallery and interact with the viewing public, thereby raising awareness to the plight of the fishing net debris and the effect it has on remote communities in Australia. There will also be a couple of other surprise installations to surprise the Singaporean public as well.

The exhibition begins on Wednesday 21st October and runs until Saturday 21st November 2015 and will be attended by several Erub Islanders together with Lynnette Griffiths and Diann Lui the Art Centre manager, in what will be for some of the Islanders’, their first ever trip overseas.

A must-see show for anyone interested in following the recent developments in Indigenous Art and an opportunity to better understand the work being done to protect our fragile eco-system and precious marine life in this amazing remote community.