By Mikayla van Loon
A month has passed since Olinda-based artist Emma Jennings launched her exhibition Stories of Giants at the Yarra Ranges Regional Museum in Lilydale.
Recounting both the destruction and calamity alongside the remarkable strength and regrowth of the storms that hit the Dandenong Ranges, in particular, with immense force in June and October 2021.
And while a major part of the exhibition was focused around Jennings’ portraits and portrayals of six different stories, an element of community healing was embedded into the project.
Having found a sense of healing herself by returning to the forest, feeling the soil in her hands and creating, Jennings said it was that experience that inspired the workshops which invited affected members of the community to do the same but in the safe space of her studio.
“I did a whole lot of work in the forest and about the forest after I was done in the emergency relief centres and when I could eventually get to a place where I could be back in the forest which was a big deal,” she said.
“That process led to the development of the community project because I found it really therapeutic just standing in there.”
Providing a comfortable environment within her Olinda gallery, Jennings said, allowed people to grieve the loss of their house, to simply reflect on a challenging time or feel the emotions they’d bottled up for months.
“A good example is somebody who is a leader in the community who was quite emotional, and she thought she was fine.
“It wasn’t until she had the permission to sit in that space and just go back in time a little bit she realised that was just below the surface and the emotion was very much still there.
“In her artwork, she wrote a beautiful poem and did a beautiful painting. Sharing her experience with the people around her was really therapeutic and healing and powerful and that’s happened in every single workshop.”
One of the most important aspects of opening the workshops to the community, Jennings said, was ensuring everyone felt comfortable to enter, no matter their experience.
“Everyone’s experiences were valid. Another curious thing is that people think that if they didn’t lose their house, then they weren’t worthy of support or acknowledging what they’ve been through.
“But again, having this place open over this whole time I’ve had residents walk in overcome with emotion when they can see the work that’s been done because they feel so connected because of their experience.
“For a lot of people it was just being without power for such a long time in the middle of winter. Winters here are cold and that was really hard and that experience is really valid.”
Because of the potential trauma that was going to enter the room and the stories of pain that could have been told, funding for the project also enabled Jennings to engage a trauma psychologist to guide her through the experience.
“It’s been kind of confronting listening to a lot of stories but I feel really privileged actually,” she said.
Red Cross volunteers were also present at every session to be of extra support and provide some mental health first aid should a participant have needed it.
The workshops invited CFA and SES volunteers, residents, Yarra Ranges Council staff and members of the community to create using natural materials, paints, words and imagery.
From the abstract to the literal, the artworks took the form and direction of whatever inspired the individual.
“People have spoken about mourning and grief. One lady wrapped paper around her log and she was embalming the tree. So that was a mourning process,” Jennings said.
For participant Deb Sargentson, she felt “so blessed” to have been given time and space to process her emotions and reflect on what had happened given she jumped straight into recovery mode.
“The beauty of art is that it enables us to interpret where we’re going. It doesn’t require words, it doesn’t require us to write, the stories are in these images, and there are so many things that have meaning to us that it enables us to process our experience without telling us how to feel or what to do,” she said.
The exhibition itself, Sargentson said, also enables a place of “hope and healing”, of quiet reflection and of comfort for others who need to go on that journey.
“It’s their way of honouring, their way of saying I’ve been able to process this in a really beautiful place. There’s no markers, there’s nowhere to go but this gives us a place to go to with no restrictions on what we feel or how we see it.”
Stories of Giants is on display until 8 September, located at the Yarra Ranges Regional Museum on Castella Street in Lilydale.
