After graduating from the SA School of Art in 1974 I received an Australia Council Living Artist Fellowship to continue work with ‘light, colour, space’. Then, in 1976, while serving a twelve-month stint as artist-in-residence at Griffith University, I witnessed a male Satin Bowerbird decorating its bower at Lamington National Park. This led to a fascination with the behaviour of bowerbirds in the wild. In 1978 I received an Arts SA grant to ‘study the art of the Golden Bowerbird’. This research led to exhibitions in Victoria, Queensland, South Australia and Spain. In 2012, John Hayward and I were commissioned to complete a sculpture titled The Bower Walk for the new Royal Adelaide Hospital.

In 2019 I joined Bill Morrow in what we called the River Bremer Project. The River Bremer in South Australia is a vastly different environment from the cloud forests of Queensland, but for me it held an equal fascination, albeit one tinged with despair. The river and its once majestic valley, severely damaged by human activity, became a metaphor for the wider damage humans have inflicted on the natural world. How could I best portray this damaged river? Reflecting on my earlier work with light, colour, space, and the abstract patterns that developed from the bowerbird work, I decided that one way would be to mark steel plates with cheap commercial paint, then place the sheets in the river at various locations. This way the river would make its own mark, the resulting ‘image’ depending on water quality, location and seasonal flow.

Ian Hamilton
2025