Drawing as intervention: site specific art and the translation of meaning

The transformation of meaning generated via drawing as mark making into the land itself is demonstrated through an environmental site-specific collaborative artwork. The Trench (2006) temporarily disrupted the natural environment to examine the politics of land as a primary source of knowledge, as cultural translations. A ten-hour excavation, in the traditional land of the Indigenous Australian group, the Larrakia people - whose country is Darwin, Australia - is where The Trench (2006) was made. Whilst viewing select Australian Indigenous material cultural collections housed at The British museum, The Natural History Museum and The Pitt Rivers Museum the artists were evoked to make the eventual work. The actual processes of excavating the land emphasized concepts of cultural continuity central to active archaeology, as identified by Peter Ucko. The work uncovered dynamic relational issues, such as those between Indigenous lands as heritage, and the impact of Western settlement, in shaping contemporary society. The site-specific artwork positions the artist-as-agent and challenges the interplay between visual culture, representation and the politics interpretation through the language of art. The Trench continues to mould itself back into the environment, made visible by a dent in the land.