A group of junior football players have kicked off a community art project designed to strengthen Newcastle residents' relationships with their local waterways.
The Kotara South players took part in hands-on clay making and photography-based activities at Upper Styx Creek today, working with professional artists to create environmentally inspired artworks that will form part of a future exhibition at Newcastle Art Gallery.
Deputy Lord Mayor Charlotte McCabe joins Ellie Hannon and Future Creek workshop facilitators Therese Keogh, Chris Brown and Holly Macdonald as they prepare for the first workshop in Kotara South on Styx Creek. The Future Creek project is one of eight initiatives supported through City of Newcastle's most recent round of environment grants, providing more than $65,000 to support activities that strengthen local biodiversity, environmental educational, habitat restoration and connection to place.
Newcastle Deputy Lord Mayor Charlotte McCabe said the grants highlight the valuable role the community plays in caring for the local environment.
"City of Newcastle is proud to support community-led environmental projects that empower people to learn, create and take action," Cr McCabe said.
"Our grants help residents connect with nature, protect biodiversity and celebrate the green spaces that make our city unique.
"These eight funded projects showcase the creativity and care that exist across Newcastle, from habitat restoration and native beehive installation to the creation of multicultural gardening spaces, the delivery of community workshops and the imaginative exploration of Styx Creek through art."
The Future Creek project is being delivered by Newcastle artist Ellie Hannon, who will use four seasonal workshops to explore community relationships with Styx Creek from the headwaters at Nesbitt Park to its outlet near the harbour. Participants will take part in clay work, photography, printmaking, letterpress and place-based cultural learning.
An evolving moveable fabric structure known as the Future Creek Canopy will be set up at each of the workshops to act as a meeting point and will be incorporated into the final exhibition alongside artworks created during the program.
Ellie Hannon said the program aims to spark deeper connections between people and their local waterways through creativity and shared experience.
"Future Creek is all about connecting community with local waterways through creative, place-based learning. Styx Creek holds so many stories, and bringing young people, artists, ecologists and community members together is a way of building a more caring and reciprocal relationship with the urbanised environment we live in," Hannon said.
"Each workshop explores the creek at a different moment in the year. As we move downstream, the artworks, conversations and the Future Creek Canopy will evolve with the landscape and I'm excited to see that journey culminate in an exhibition at Newcastle Art Gallery."
Other grant recipients include Kotara's March Street community garden, which also hosted its first event today in a seasonal series of pollinator workshops led by local artist Gemma Kirschner and environmental scientist Tristan Pintus. Workshops are open to members and the local community, covering topics of different pollinator species in Australia, how to keep them safe and guidance to encourage pollinators.
Volunteers of Obelisk Hill Arcadia Park Landcare planted 250 native trees on Friday as part of the next stage of their restoration works in Nesca Park, supported by the City of Newcastle grant. This followed a range of recent activities, including weed-clearing and the installation of water points and nesting boxes throughout the par, while climate change plots and educational signage will be placed in coming months to complete the project.
Other funded projects include a native beehive and student education program at Carrington Public School and the revegetation of 250 square metres on Ash Island led by the Friends of the Schoolmasters House, which will replace non-native grass with local native plants and eliminate the need for machine mowing while creating a habitat for bees, birds and other wildlife.
The grants also support Multicultural Neighbourhood Centre's improvements to its community garden with new garden beds, a worm farm and compost bin, as well as a new sun shelter at Silsoe Street Community Garden.
