Catalogue writing: 'Benthic Community Flutes Sketch 2 (Snapping and Sandy-ghost Shrimp, Swamp Scrub, Mussel) has been made alongside the inter-tidal flows of Moonee Ponds Creek and its conjunction with the great Birrarung/
Yarra River, Wurundjeri Country. This sketch includes blown glass flutes inspired by the burrows of the sandy ghost shrimp, field recordings of snapping shrimp and mussels at the meeting area of Moonee and Birrarung, beeswax flute recordings, and sand structures. Benthic communities are complex inter-tidal ecosystems of flora and fauna that live in waterways and coastal areas. The glass flutes are an expression of subterranean organisms that produce porous thresholds of ground, water, and organic matter, with the work being formed in the movement between the flutes, their sounding in different places and the forces of the creek itself. These structures are brought into proximity with sites of concreted drains which impose limits on the diverse lives of animals and microorganisms that might otherwise thrive within the site of the creek. The gravity of benthic ground is thick with forces, and the breath of these forces reverberate in figuring them.'
Video credit: Benjamin Woods, Benthic Community Flutes Sketch 2 (Snapping and Sandy-ghost Shrimp, Swamp Scrub,
Mussel), video, 2023, field recording, performance documentation, digital video and stereo audio, 14min
57sec, videography by Elena Betros-Lopez, courtesy of the artist.
Figuring Ground project is supported by the NSW Government through Create NSW.
Images: Katie Holmes
