Background

The Overwintering Project is an environmental art project inviting artists from Australia and New Zealand to visit, research, and respond to the unique nature of their local migratory shorebird habitat. Australia and New Zealand have over 100* internationally important shorebird overwintering sites#. These sites are not interchangeable: each possesses a unique combination of physical and biological features that make it the perfect sanctuary for migratory shorebirds to return to year after year. 

PROJECT AIMS

·       to raise awareness of Australia and New Zealand as the major destination for migratory shorebirds of the East Asian-Australasian Flyway, as they spend the greatest single portion of their migratory cycle on our shores (Sept./Oct. – April/May)

·       to raise community and individual awareness of the intrinsic value, uniqueness and biodiversity of local shorebird habitat

·       to map a personal response to the richness of our shores 

·       to link artists around Australia and New Zealand

·       to create an informed and interwoven community of informed people who care about migratory shorebirds and their habitat.

This project is expected to continue for at least five years. The project website will list Overwintering Project exhibitions and deadlines and display images of the art generated in response to each site. Informal groups of printmakers and/or print workshops are invited to hold their own Overwintering Exhibitions. The conditions are as below for organising bodies and galleries. 

The Overwintering Project is designed to be organic in nature. In my experience of co-ordinating the shorebird-related project, ‘The Flyway Print Exchange’, the idea of the Flyway and the shorebirds that migrate annually along it resonated with far more artists than could practically join the original project. We overcame this limitation by holding other exhibitions where local artists could make related artwork and exhibit these alongside the Flyway Print Exchange. This led to some beautiful exhibitions, but it would have been more satisfying to incorporate those artists’ works permanently into a larger project. The Overwintering Project is designed to be able to contain the works of as many artists as want to be a part of it.

Australia has 36 species of migratory shorebirds that breed above the Arctic Circle in Siberia and Alaska, migrating south to spend the major part of their migratory cycle (October – May) on the shores of Australia and New Zealand. The route they fly annually between their two homes is called the East Asian-Australasian Flyway, and their journeys link 23** countries from New Zealand to Russia along the coast of Asia through which they fly, stop to rest and refuel, and breed. They travel this 25,000 circuit every year of their adult lives.

Largely due to their dependence on habitat in every one of the 23 Flyway countries – most of which number among the fastest-growing economies on the planet – migratory shorebirds are the fastest declining group of birds in Australia. As their home for the majority of the year, we in Australia and New Zealand have a particular responsibility to preserve their critical overwintering habitat. Through the Overwintering Project I hope to raise awareness of migratory shorebirds  – their existence and their needs  – to help us do our part to preserve the lives of these extraordinary creatures.

READ AN ARTICLE FROM IMPRINT HERE

The Print Portfolio

Printmakers are invited to create and contribute one print in response to the unique nature of their local shorebird habitat. In pondering how their local habitat is precious to shorebirds, artists are also invited to reveal how it is precious to them. Migratory shorebirds provide the focus for the project, but artists can respond to any aspect that they perceive as rendering the area unique e.g. the geology, prey species, tidal patterns, flora, other local native fauna etc.

Artists can contact the Project Co-ordinator Kate Gorringe-Smith for information about their local shorebird habitat.

Contributed prints will become part of a unique print portfolio, the Overwintering Project Print Portfolio, which will provide an in-depth personal response to our unique coast and the sites on which our migratory shorebirds depend. At the project’s end, the portfolio will be donated to a state or national collection. 

How to join the Overwintering Project Print Portfolio

Artists must contact the Project Co-ordinator Kate Gorringe-Smith in order to join the project. If required, I can provide help find information about your local migratory shorebird habitat and put you in touch with local shorebird experts. I will also send you the project documentation including general information and the Artists’ Agreement. I will also put you on the mailing list for the project newsletter. Email: overwinteringproject@gmail.com

The Overwintering Print Portfolio provides both the fundraising aspect of the Overwintering Project and the enduring core of work that can be exhibited at any time to aid shorebird or coastal conservation.

The Overwintering Print Portfolio will be cumulative, i.e. prints will continue to be accepted until the end of the project. This means that if an artist misses a deadline or does not hear of the project until after a deadline, there will be other opportunities to join the project until the project ends.

Artists Anthony Albrecht and Simone Slattery , the Bowerbird Collective, are artists engaging with the project and will be speaking at the Learning Exchange. See their video below.

ZOOM LEARNING EXCHANGE

On 6 August Kate Gorring-Smith is our key provocateur about how artists can engage in environmental projects using their practice. She will be describing the the Overwintering Project which will be on view at Burnie Regional Art Gallery in December 2020.

You can book to attend the Learning Exchange here

More info

 For further information please contact Kate Gorringe-Smith, Overwintering Project Co-ordinator.

M: 0432 322 408 

E: overwinteringproject@gmail.com  

W: www.theoverwinteringproject.com  www.kategorringesmith.com.au

FB: @theoverwinteringproject 

Instagram: @kategorringesmith #theoverwinteringproject 

*the existing list of sites was identified in the paper Bamford M, Watkins D, Bancroft W, Tischler G and J Wahl. 2008. Migratory Shorebirds of the East Asian - Australasian Flyway; Population Estimates and Internationally Important Sites. Wetlands International Oceania. Canberra, Australia.

#many of these sites have global significance and are also listed under the Ramsar Convention Treaty as internationally significant wetlands (www.ramsar.org ), and are Key Biodiversity Areas (A Global Standard for the Identification of Key Biodiversity Areas was launched by BirdLife International and ten other leading conservation NGOs in September 2016 http://www.birdlife.org.au/projects/KBA ).

** The East-Asian Australasian Flyway extends from Arctic Russia and North America to New Zealand and is used by over 50 million migratory waterbirds. The countries that comprise the East-Asian Australasian Flyway are: the USA (Alaska); Russia (Siberia); Mongolia; China; North Korea; South Korea; Japan; the Philippines; Vietnam; Laos; Thailand; Cambodia; Myanmar; Bangladesh; India; Malaysia; Singapore; Brunei; Indonesia; Timor; Papua New Guinea; Australia and New Zealand.

This project is endorsed by BirdLife Australia and by the East Asian-Australasian Flyway Partnership.

Community engagement

On August 6th ArTELIER artists will be invited to create works with their local communities of children and young people for the Burnie Regional Art Gallery exhibition.