There is a rhythmic tap, tap, tap emanating from Julie Blyfield’s studio in Maylands, Tarntanya (Adelaide) that sounds in concert with the birds of the surrounding garden. It is in this space and its orbit that the artist undertakes a daily vigil: being with, caring for and then recreating nature in her own vision.
A garden begins with the intimacy of the hand touching the earth. Soil is turned and sifted, seeds scattered, vegetation plucked. The science of nature’s cycles is considered, its erratic changes negotiated. The garden expresses an ‘exchange between the self and the atmosphere’, wrote poet Stanley Kunitz. If we remain observant and mindful of the garden’s needs, it nurtures us with fragrance and food, colour and shape, humming insect activity and stirrings in the dark…