To the fallen trees...

Background: Art Historian Claire Bishop, a key author on participatory art, influenced the methodology of 'To the fallen trees...' Bishop interprets participatory art as “striving to collapse the distinction between performer and audience, professional and amateur, production and reception…emphasis is on collaboration, and the collective dimension of social experience” (Bishop, 2006). The project was developed with individuals of the Yarra Ranges community, collapsing the distinction between the collaborators and providing a platform to emotionally express the shared traumatic experience of the Victorian Windstorms of June 2021 in the Dandenong Ranges. Collaborators were from various cultural backgrounds, ages and varying creative skills and abilities. Our research asks: How can a public participatory art project express the eco-anxiety of a community, in regards to increasing extreme weather conditions? Contribution: Through a site analysis via field visits, meetings with Yarra Ranges museum staff, public art officers and community, we identified One Tree Hill as an appropriate site for a project. Large piles of tree debris lay in the site as evidence of the devastation, inspiring us to consider how we connect with the environment via the site. Our intention was to direct the communities’ sorrow to the tree community by writing ‘letters of empathy’ to the fallen trees. By connecting with local networks, we identified collaborating contributors who participated in writing letters and publicly read them as a performative work. Significance: 'To the fallen trees…' focused on developing a collaborative outcome, by expressing the social impact of ecological devastation in the Dandenongs. This project was selected for the inaugural launch of the Big Anxiety Festival in Naarm /Melbourne in 2022, Australia’s premier art and mental health festival. An interview about To the fallen trees…was held with 3MDR radio on October 9 2022.