After spending a month or so back in Brisbane I put together a small body of works that I had produced in Beijing. I think the quality of the prints are not to an optimum standard, however the concept was the most important factor in the development of these works and I shall continue to follow this line of action.

This is the short statement that was supplied at the Griffith University Tribune st Gallery

August 2007.

New works by Paula Payne August 2007

Panorama; reflections through the looking glass

During my recent travels in April, May and June of 2007 through China, Taiwan, and Tibet, I photographed ancient trees from a variety of species. The trees were obviously regarded with great value and were cared for in sacred locations such as the Temple of Heaven in Beijing, which is well known for its ancient oaks and an elaborate, opulent, Buddhist retreat in the centre of Taiwan called Chung Tai Chan Monastery. The monastery has been built recently on the donations of the wealthy upper/middle classes who are devout Buddhists like so many in Taiwan today.

I was struck by the way in which the botanical specimens were cared for and presented. The trees, like silent sentinels more ancient than you or I are positioned in places of worship, like beautiful women objects of the gaze. They are presented in enclosed areas protected by fences and surrounded by soft grasses; such gardens could allude to Eden’s from our own biblical history. However if one were to associate man made environments such as these with the emotional disposition of the cultures of which they are a part, these green sanctuaries could easily represent landscapes of sobriety, and reinforce notions of what it is to be of value in a world of order.

In many cultures beautiful gardens are used to allude to the influences and the values held in esteem by that culture. The trees, which some how manage to take on anthropomorphic dimensions, become not only testaments to time and longevity, but also act as living examples of species lovingly cared for by their keepers.
During these encounters I find myself worshipping the magnificence of long standing trees, and I reflected upon the order of things and the relationship between humans and their environments.

Back in Australia I have always maintained a fascination for the untameable littoral zones of our foreshores, with their tidal mud’s, insects, strange mutating trees and floating seeds. Of course I am referring to the mangal swamps of our tropical and subtropical coastlines, estuaries and swamps where evergreen trees and shrubs thrive in the tidal mud and sand inundated with daily waters.

The saturated mud flat of the typical mangrove swamp is a hostile environment for most typical plants and certainly would not host the glorious specimens mentioned above. The soil has low levels of oxygen for the roots and high levels of sulphides. Mangrove trees appear to have special mechanisms to permit them to take up water from the saline muddy soil without making their water conduits salty. The emotional disposition that I invest these landscapes with is one of pragmatism, and relates to a drive toward survival. The mangal species perfects the act of establishing new colonies that creep from the seaward zone to the landward zone making a gradual transition toward the terrestrial forests, adapting, surviving and prospering in unusual circumstance.

With this body of work I have contemplated the differences that exist between cultures and their landscapes, man made or otherwise. I acknowledge the aesthetics of a manicured beauty, tranquillity, sobriety, and applaud the resilience and adaptability of these very different species of trees. I also celebrate the contrasts and differences between the cultures of which I associate them.