The Hearth of the Matter
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The Land | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
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June 2005 - 4 Denison Road - after a 10 month search for the location, by a lucky chance, I met Shaun and Caroline who are enthusiastic in joining this adventure and have generously agreed to let this project be built on their land.|
The Blessing of the Land |
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November 2005 - On the 13th of November, we came together for a blessing ceremony of the land starting by acknowledging the traditional owners dwellers and carers of this land, learning that this particular area used to be a meeting point for three tribes of Northern Tasmania. Vicki West, a Tasmanian aboriginal artist led us into a smoking ritual which was traditionally practiced as an act of cleansing and purifying. We gathered leaves of indigenous trees and smoked them in the fire, accompanied by the chanting of a blessing from the indigenous Hebrew tradition. We heard some stories and local myths of the block, and shared that great Australian tradition of a cuppa and some bikkies.
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Ground Breaking |
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November 2005 - official ground breaking took place on November 18th.
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Sign Raising |
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December 2005 - official sign raising took place on December 14th, informing the public that "something is happening" and to open the door for the local community to engage in "the happening".... The sign also serves as a public acknowledgement and thankyou for the generous support and assistance of the following: | Arts Alive Inc DocSigns Utas Crossroads GL & VN Barber Pty Ltd (sawmillers and timber merchants) Interweave Carey Hire Sherlock's Building Services...
Excavation Round 2 |
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January 2006 - the second round of excavation included digging a drainage trench (after we discovered what appears to be an underground spring) and shaping the spiral ramp descending into the bottom of the pit. Bobby Sherlock, our excavator, was thrilled to add an artistic expression to his work and exclaimed he now feels like a sculptor! The dome in the background is a 3 metre prototype we built in the School of Architecture worshop to test our construction technique.
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Constructing the Dome Part 1 - the Base Ring |
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February 2006 - the laminated base ring of the dome is 7 metres diameter and consists of 4 layers of bent green Tasmanian oak. The ring took the best part of a day to build - thank you to Laen, Mathew, Sieg and Janine (who was behind the camera) - what a great day with wonderful people!
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Constructing the Dome Part 2 - the First Arches |
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March 2006 - it looks so simple but it was much harder than it looks! The timber has to be bent to shape within a day of cutting and each arch is made up of three lengths of green timber. Although it was tricky, Laen and I built the arches in an afternoon - thank you Laen for your enthusiastic involvment.
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Constructing the Dome Part 3 - the work continues |
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March 2006 - another fine March day in action! Thanks again to all the wonderful enthusiastic builders - Laen, Sandra, Tanya, Dave and Siobhan (our photographer for the day). The dome in front is our 3 metre protype which we use to test various parts of the construction before applying it to the actual 7 metre dome (seen in the background).
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Constructing the Dome Part 4 - almost done |
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March 2006 - a couple more days labour and the framework is nearly completed and will support a considerable weight - as we demonstrate here. We still need to give the dome more structure before we can render it with earth - we'll do this by weaving progressively finer lengths of green timber.
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Miledome Day |
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Miledome Day - 20th May 2006 - Miledome Day is the term we coined to signify a milestone in the project. As if to promise us a beautiful day, we were greeted by a beautiful crane gently presenting itself as an ambassador of goodwill, on the top of the dome. Gathering inside the dome we prepared ourselves towards the act of walking the dome onto its earthen cradle - by raising the awareness of the way we use our bodies, not to damage it in the process, as well as letting our voices rise singing Od Yavo Shalom Aleinu, which means "Yet more still and again peace will come upon us and the whole world" | After a beautiful blessing offered by Dave Cooper we set to our task for the day - to our surprise the dome seemed to lift itself on its own and in no time it ascended the slope and was very close to being at home in its final resting place.
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We embraced the space with a small ceremony: lighting a candle at the centre point of the big nest and placing next to it the little spiral breads which Hannah had especially baked. Everyone was invited to draw in their energy by stepping down the spiral path and to break some of the bread. | After the dome was quietly left to adjust to its new form on the earth, it was definitely time for some lunch. Thank you to all the many wonderful people who generously came to share this day. On this occasion I would like to offer a special thanks to the Landscape Artchitect - Niall Simpson, who with his faith has supported and assisted me on this project from the start. Niall, who conducted the shift of the dome, was crucial to the success of this day.
Garland Day - Shavuot |
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Garland day - Shavuot - 2 June 2006
| The sky through the dome embraces the space. We spent the first few minutes of today in amazement when we noticed that the webs on the dome formed a Star of David - this was completely by accident! Wanting to introduce a softer form for the square shaped "eye of the dome", I invited Siegi, a local artist who has become a special friend, to weave a garland. Interestingly, there was no conscious intention the making of the garland coincided with Shavuot - the harvest holiday in the Jewish tradition - it just turned out that way! Gathering flowering winter plants of the southern hemisphere seemed an appropriate way to weave cultures together through the plants. A small group of women gathered on the day, each bringing a sprig from their garden to mesh into the base of the garland which was made of native plants. After sharing her history of making garlands, Siegi read a poem about garlands. Humming a special tune, we raised and placed the big ring of plants onto what now looks like the navel of this earthen womb.
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And inside the dome the spiral path has started to pave its way into the earth... | Thanks to all the lovely women who assisted us weave another thread of this project. Special thanks to Rosin McCann from the ABC local radio, for the continuos reporting the progress of the project to the local community, to Esther who quietly recorded behind the camera to assist in sharing the story, and to Siegi for the vigorous and voluptuous garland.
Muddays |
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MUDDAYS - June 2006
| June 2006 - Muddays - this is what most of the fine clear sunny and cold winter days of Launceston look like at the site of the dome. Dipping hesian cloth in slip clay we started the process of rendering the dome with earth. Thank you to Fairlie, Lucy, Sarah and Kate who joined into the pleasures of the mudworld and to Fiona who supported and stood behind the camera...
WINTER SOLSTICE |
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Winter Solstice - an Earth-full Celebration June 2006
| 24 June 2006 - Winter Solsctice - To honour the winter solstice, a group of 6 women gathered to celebrate our connection with the earth. The day started with lighting a candle at the bottom of the spiral and chanting a song we had learned for the occasion.
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At the conclusion of our morning ceremony the work continued of rendering the dome with earth.
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Everything went smoothly until (to our horror!) one of the supports for the dome started to bend under the weight of the wet render. The work had to stop immediatley. Thanks to Shaun's instant response and experience we were able to lift the dome back to its position and secure it by putting 2 timber posts underneath the weakened structure. This allowed us to continue with the evening celebration...
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Towards sunset people started to arrive. At a signal from Siegi one by one, people gathered around to start the evening ceremony. Lead by Fiona, we descended into the spiral and lit a candle to symbolise the light in the darkness, chanting the song we had learned that morning. And then in a tradition that crosses all cultures, the food was served and celebrated. | Thank you to the ladies who gave an earthful hand on the day and to all those who braved the cold in the evening - special thanks to Shaun for his support in every sense of the word at a very insecure moment for me and the dome. Thanks to Siegi and Fiona for weaving a beautiful ceremony and Karlin for her soulful clarinet. Thanks to Willy for capturing the evening with his camera and to Paul for his sound recording.
MUDDAYS |
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Muddays - July and August 2006
| July and August were filled with muddays. Trying to manage our way around the tricky days of winter wasn't easy. Building with mud is obviously not a winter task but we still made it between the rain that makes the site all slippery, waiting for the ice to melt in the buckets from the morning frost; shifts of the directions of the wind which actually assisted the drying of the mud. | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
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Our dome proves to be holding the weather well - after going back an forth along the path shifting buckets full of loam there's nothing much more to do but laugh - thanks to all the wonderful people who joined in to give a mud full hand: Evelyn, Dave, Helen, Edmond, Linda, John, Caroline, Brian, Paul, Tanya, Zeer, Richard, Ambelica, Lyn,Mara, Jim, Bob and Willie. A very special thanks to Fairlie who spent hours and hours day after day thoroughly padding and patting the dome with straw and clay and encouraging me on the way. Also to both Fiona and Fairlie for sending out a big call into the community spreading the word and calling out to people to join so that we could finish the work on time.
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CHANGES | |
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Changes - August and September 2006 Changes- between the fog and bright sunny days, blossoms appear on the cherry plum tree on site. And as the render is applied onto the structure the dome fleshes up and every day it looks different from both inside and outside. | |
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FRAME AND ROOF | |
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Frame and Roof A frame starts to take its shape around the dome- an icon symbol shape of a house. The difficult part was to figure out they way to lift the roof above the dome without hurting the dome. Once again our dome proved to be strong when it managed to hold the weight of the beams made of green timber, and people climbing up and down on it. Once the braces were put we were happy to check its strength and climbed to the tip of the roof. | |
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Once again a big thanks to Niall for all the time spent on thinking planning and hands on work on site. Thanks to Philip Ralf and Shaun for the strong encouraging hand and to Daniel, Andrew and Martin who miraculously arrived just on time when their special expertise where needed.
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NOW | |
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Now We are almost there just a few more additions inside and outside and we will be ready for the grand opening event, which will occur even if the structure is not complete as we came to the realisation that home is always under construction... | |
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Coming soon October 1st - 'Home Welcoming' event .... | |