Get Creative with Stanthorpe Regional Art Gallery

Get Creative with Mary Findlay from Stanthorpe Regional Art Gallery

Transcript from the podcast “Speak Out Loud: Stories of Strength from the Southern Downs”

SEASON 2: EPISODE 5

GUEST: Mary Findlay, Director Stanthorpe Regional Art Gallery

PUBLISHED: 7th March 2022

Stantghorpe Street Art
“WHATEVER THE WEATHER, WE STAND TOGETHER”
https://www.srag.org.au/stanthorpe-street-art

[00:00:00] Mary: I talk about uniqueness there. Not one of them, not one artwork is the same. And that tells you a little bit about yourself. So find your uniqueness of what you would like to do and follow that in your heart and do it because it does give you peace. And especially with the things that we’re kind of facing. It connects you to yourself, first to yourself and then it can connect you to other people.

[00:00:23] Kathryn: Mary Findlay is my guest on the podcast today. Mary is the director of the Stanthorpe Regional Art Gallery and her enthusiasm for connecting people to the creative arts is incredibly contagious. As Mary says, the arts are a wonderful connector that brings people together as well as being a valuable way to express your own voice or story.

Mary, welcome to the podcast. Can you tell us what your connection is with the Southern Downs?

[00:01:05] Mary: Kathryn, thanks very much for inviting me, first of all. And connection. Well, oh about 20 odd years ago, I came up here for my honeymoon with my husband, it’s really his connection. So his mother was born up here in Nundubbermere which is a sheep station on the Texas Road. And we came up here for our honeymoon and that was kind of it. I’d heard about Stanthorpe. And a friend of mine had moved up who was an artist as well. And then several years later we bought a 10 acre property. Then and several years later we moved up and I got a job at the high school and then subsequently got this job as the director at the Stanthorpe Regional Art Gallery. I feel like I’ve known this place for a long time, although it hasn’t been really my connection, but I suppose now it has, I come from a tiny village in Scotland about the size of Wallangarra on the east coast of Scotland near the, um, North Sea. The sense of community here and this smallness, I think really I was never a city girl and the city is kinda too big for me and so when I came here, I felt the sense of peace and, and I feel it’s a really, really strong community, so that’s my connection at this point. And I think slowly over time, you know, the investment in the community and then other people invest in you and that strengthens you, your connection to the place and to the people so that’s where I’m at at this time and it’s strengthening every moment, I suppose, really.

[00:02:36] Kathryn: Mary, could you tell us a little bit more about the Stanthorpe Regional Art Gallery and the role that you have here?

[00:02:43] Mary: Yeah, this is my sixth year and um Nicole Holly was here before me and she was a young Irish girl and she kind of woke the place up a bit with her ideas and everything. And then I heard that through the grapevine that her job was there. And I, I was teaching art up at the high school amongst other subjects and my background’s with theatre with Zen Zen Zo theatre company in Brisbane for 10 years, so I applied for the job and got it, which it was 4th of October, five years ago, last year. So it’s nearly six, this I’m in my sixth year. And it was a 90 degree learning curve, but this gallery has at this point 71 active volunteers. Some of them have been here for over 20 years and they know this gallery inside out. We have a 4 million just underneath a $4 billion collection that’s been gathered over many years. We have a very, um, feisty and wonderful calendar of events and lots of exhibitions we change every six weeks. We have a biennial art prize, which was last year, and that was a $50,000 art prize national. We had a photography prize last year and another national prize. We’ve got the, at present a local art prize, but we do favour local art here. And this particular exhibition is, just to give you, as a kind of example, there’s 95 works here from 95 different people. So that gives you an insight to how many artists are here. And there’s a few people I know haven’t entered for a variety of reasons. We’ve run a boutique and under that boutique it’s all local art and all that money goes back into the local community of artists. And as you know, during the last few years, it’s been difficult for artists, you know, um, performance art, everything to, you know, to make a living out of what they do. So that has been really, really useful. So I think the art gallery I’m kind of the face of it, but really, it’s been around for over 70 years in different forms in different places here. And then 33 years ago, 34 maybe now, they pushed for an actual bespoke gallery and no one can believe that we have such a kind of large, beautiful gallery as this in a small town. And these people who there’s a whole, um, what is it? The triangle of them behind me have pushed to this point in time. And, they valued art and I often thought, why it was so valued and there’s so many artists and so much creativity here is like during the 18th century. Cause we are having the hundred and 50th of Stanthorpe this year. We’ve done a lot of research and um, there was a sanatorium here and people came up here because of TB and well there was no television or anything. So they drew and they painted. And then there was the first world war people came up to recover from that. And then people didn’t have television. They didn’t have radios. There was theatre and plays people put on and there was poetry nights. There was art club. And then there’s a huge Italian influence here as well. And I think the cultural, uh, marriage of colonial people and the Italians was really amazing and they’ve fought hard for their place in this town and brought their culture here, which has been fabulous. But I mean, one thing I admitted to see that Indigenous people here long before us and we in our hundred and 50th, we’ve actually got some artwork and we’ve had permission to put a photograph in there from the Kambuwal people and so art has been practised by humans for thousands and thousands of years. And we’re just carrying on as a way of expressing ourself, our emotions, our stories, the things we’re thinking about, the things we’re worried about. And it’s a way of doing this. And I think that’s what makes art so important. For me anyway.

[00:06:39] Kathryn: Mary, you were talking about different art exhibitions and photography. And that brings me to the next question that I wanted to ask you about, which is the Hope and Growth Photography Exhibition, which was a community exhibition that began in late 2021. Stanthorpe is in the heart of this Granite Belt area which is at the southern end of the Southern Downs Region. And this whole area had been experiencing severe drought for quite a number of years and then there were the bush fires in 2019 and 2020. There were a number of them and I know there were fires before and after that as well. And since that time, we’ve had some other challenging events such as floods and the COVID-19 pandemic which has brought a few extra bumps to the region’s recovery journey. But one of the wonderful projects that was created as part of the region’s recovery journey, was this photography exhibition called Hope and Growth. Could you tell us a little bit more about how that began and what sort of benefits there are for the community and for the people who got involved with that project?

[00:07:53] Mary: Yeah, I think it was really timely, you know, because people were struggling in some ways of, you know, I think acknowledging that we had gone forward, even though there had been other issues after the fire and all that sort of things and the drought that we’d experienced all that time. So there was a chance then in that particular project to celebrate some of the things, but also acknowledge what had happened to us and not let it go, you know, like it’s happened, but as usual things do happen and they’re not what we want, but people stand up and they’re counted and they come together and they survive. And which is what we did. I feel really strongly, we did survive as a community. So the word was out that um photography, and we’d done this during Crisps Art Prize. We’d ask people to send to the gallery photographs to us of things that were happening to them and everything. And we put it up on our webpage. So it was put out again to photographers or people in the, in the region to send them to the council as well, because they were kind of putting this together with the recovery resilience and getting us back. And so they were chosen some of the photographs that did remind us hope and growth, but also reminded us of what we had done to survive. And there was three exhibitions. Was one down at Jamworks and one in town and then one at Vincenzo’s. And I thought they were kind of really timely because they were south, the middle and we had all experienced everybody in these communities had experienced the fire particularly and the drought. So, um, we were able to put these exhibitions up and come together again to um, the word celebrate isn’t perhaps correct, but acknowledge, and celebrate what we, how we had survived and how we continue to overcome things there. And to see some of the beautiful shots of growth from, you know, nature and nature had grown again after being burned to what we thought would never recover and what happens? You know, it, it does recover. And that gives you hope and hence the name Hope and Growth because it does give you hope. So I thought it was a really, really important exhibition and the Rural Fire Brigade were part of that as well. And there was photographs of them and they were there at every occasion because people looked to them at the time to help us and they did and um, it was unbelievable. And I know many of these people and, you know, we, we were all feeling very fragile at the time, so it was great to look back on it and see, well, we had felt pretty tricky, but here we are now, so yeah. Very important.

[00:10:39] Kathryn: A really lovely way to reflect and look forward to the future with some hope. Stanthorpe has a reputation for creative arts, as you were mentioning, before Mary. What else is on offer for locals as well as for visitors to get involved with arts projects or arts pursuits?

[00:11:01] Mary: Well, oh my goodness. I’m overwhelmed by how much there is to do. I mean, just to start with the gallery, you know, we have our fibre art group every second Wednesday. So they knit and a lot of them make their own patterns. And mix things up and they meet here. Every Wednesday we have an art group who meet here. We have workshops during the school holidays for young people and workshops during the year, like during the Apple and Grape. We’ve got our Indigenous basket weaving going on if you have a look on the webpage. Other great celebrations of art is GBART, which is a group that’s come together there. And we have one weekend where everybody in the district who are artists come out and show their wares, and this has become a tourist attraction. So it brings other things to the region as far as accommodation, and as far as for restaurants and things, but people can showcase their work and that has being hugely successful. We’ve got, um, the pottery club has been here for over 50 years and they have workshops if you’re interested in that. It’s really nice. And so many people willing to help you start off as a beginner. It’s always a bit intimidating, but these people really do help you. And we have Artworks are part, um, the QR Precinct. So they run art classes all the time, which is on the webpage there. They’ve got I think working Monday, Tuesday on a Friday and I think there’s cheese-making classes going on on a Saturday and then you’ve got another one, Laurie’s Larrikins. They’re up in the Agricultural Society on the Monday morning and Borderline are another group of artists who cross the border from Tenterfield in here. They’ve been together for, I think, a long, long, long, long time, 50 years, a long time. And they are very strong group as well. And there just seems to be something going on all the time, you know, for different things to do. And if you feel that you wanted to get involved in any of these, you know, please, you know, give me a ring and I can put you in the right direction. But I think what it does bring to people that when I noticed some of the group on, particularly the Wednesday group who are in the room next to me, and I’m often sit and have a cup of tea with them, is there’s all different levels. One person had never painted before in her life. And she’s a single person. And I know that, her horse had to be put down and things like that. And she came to the Wednesday group and, and that was really sad for her, but she had a group of people who shared that sadness. They were all loved nature and knew that. So there’s a sense of community in that little group that’s really lovely. And I was sort of saying to them, Do you think you’d ever like to put a little small exhibition together and we could celebrate? And they sort of giggle and think that might be a good idea or it might not be a good idea. When I go up to Artworks on a Thursday, I get invited for coffee there and there’s poetry every Thursday and they read poetry and it’s humorous and it’s social commentary and it’s, some of it’s a bit sad sometimes. And then there’s people who paint at that same time, again, all different levels and people just pop in and they have coffee at 10 o’clock and do the poetry. If you’d like to just have a look at that. I think there’s lots of musicians here. People come in, we have a piano in the gallery too, if you’d like to. Grand piano in beautiful condition. Many backpackers come in and play that, other people when they’re doing their exams play it. One of the volunteers just plays it cause she likes playing it. And so there’s a lot of music here as well and teachers who teach music. So I think there’s so much creativity here, and I think it does bring people together. And I find it really a way that people can express themself. It’s what they paint. They don’t paint as a person the same next to them. You know, they have different choices. Some are doing water colors. Some are doing acrylic. Some are using pastels. Some are just drawing. And so it’s, um, something they seem to, when I observed their participation in that, there’s number one, a sense of connectedness on their art connects them together. Then there’s a sense of peace when they’re actually doing the work. So they lose themselves in the work and there’s peacefulness in what they’re doing. And there’s also they share capabilities and skills, like someone’ll say, Oh, I can’t get this bloody tree right. Or, you know, something like that, I can’t get this right. And I remember one of the, another artists who came down one day for a meeting with me and someone was struggling with perspective and he did a quick fix on perspective, which was really super. So I think such sharing of skills and the fact that you don’t have to feel that you’re perfect or ultra good or you know, anything. And I think we discussed before that people say they aren’t creative. And I think everybody is creative in different ways. It can be gardening. There’s a community garden up within the Artworks Precinct which is a QR Precinct. And they meet a couple of times a week, which is really amazing. And they create gardens. They create food, they, um, brought some peaches along the team came on Saturday. The steam train came on Saturday at 10:15, but it was late because we had a tree over the thing. So we all hung around and someone had dropped peaches along for us to share from the community garden. So whether it be gardening, I find for myself, cooking is great for me. I love cooking. You know, I love gardening because it just gives me peace and I feel like I’m in nature and you really enjoy it. So lots of things to do.

[00:16:51] Kathryn: Lots of things to do by yourself, but also lots of things to do if you choose to gather with another group. Sounds so vibrant.

[00:16:59] Mary: People YouTube things to learn things too, you know, if, if technology has its benefits and other things, but we won’t talk about that are annoying, but you know, if you want to do something, you can have a look at that too. So there’s lots of ways to do it on your own too.

[00:17:13] Kathryn: If someone’s listening in and is feeling inspired to get involved with a community project, or one of the groups, or even to take up a new hobby that helps them to express themselves creatively, have you got any advice for them, Mary, on how to get started?

[00:17:29] Mary: Number one, you can phone the gallery or look on our website or any of the websites around here. And I mean, if you’re in Warwick, Warwick Art Gallery, again, get in touch with them. And they know other community groups that are doing things as well. And I suppose, talk to people, I think, follow your heart and making time to do something that you have thought that you might want to do. Is it writing every day? Is it a bit of poetry? Is it spending 10 or 15 minutes? If I spend 10 or 15 minutes in my garden, I can actually pull out a few weeds and sort things, put a rock here and there, you know, try and give yourself some time. It is really, really important to give yourself some time because um you deserve it. And creativity, you might say to yourself, it doesn’t exist, but it’s hidden away inside you. And maybe you’ve been told you aren’t creative. But during the Crisp’s Art Prize, we had 918 entries from all students in this area. Kids who don’t paint, who don’t do things. Cause I go and visit all the schools. And when I asked the teachers, they thoroughly, thoroughly enjoy it. And everybody has a goal and I talk about uniqueness there. Not one of them, not one artwork is the same. And that tells you a little bit about yourself. So find your uniqueness of what you would like to do and follow that in your heart and do it because it does give you peace. And especially with the things that we’re kind of facing. It connects you to yourself, first to yourself and then it can connect you to other people.

[00:19:08] Kathryn: That sounds just absolutely inspiring, Mary, thank you. Is there anything else that you’d like to share with us about the arts generally or about the Stanthorpe Regional Art Gallery?

[00:19:21] Mary: I think arts transcends things. It transcends differences. You know, the street art that we have here, you don’t have to walk through a door and feel intimidated if you’ve never been to a place like an art gallery before, but you can see it in the streets. So public art is seriously important. So I think art to me during this time, I’ve noticed that people have found a lot of peace and joy in singing and creating music, all the forms of creativity that, that are in the world. We have really, really enjoyed it. So participate enjoy and find your muse.

[00:19:59] Kathryn: Thank you so much, Mary. You did mention the art gallery website. We’ll include a link to that in the show notes for this episode. And, we’ll try to link up as many of those groups that you mentioned as possible into the show notes. I think on the gallery website there’s also a page, a bit of a directory?

[00:20:19] Mary: Yes, there is. And we give it out freely. If any of the art groups want to put their webpage, we put a link on because we see ourselves as trying to bring people together and people are, it doesn’t have to be at the art gallery. You find where it suits you, you know, to be a part of whatever it is.

[00:20:37] Kathryn: So it’s a wonderful way for people to get connected. Thank you very much for your time today, Mary.

[00:20:41] Mary: Thank you Kathryn.

[00:20:42] Kathryn: Thanks for listening to the Speak Out Loud Stories of Strength podcast with me, Kathryn Walton. I hope this episode inspires you to get involved and to get connected with your community. You can find the transcript and any links mentioned in this episode, in the show notes and please share the podcast with your friends.

We acknowledge and pay respect to the past, present and future Traditional Custodians and Elders of this nation and the continuation of cultural, spiritual, and educational practices of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander peoples. Series Two of this podcast has been jointly funded under the Commonwealth and State Disaster Recovery Funding Arrangements 2018.