Kathleen McArthur and Wild/flower Women II: Art, environment and activism. A living legacy for our ‘wild’ flower women! (Exhibition at Caloundra Regional Gallery 3 May-17 June 2018 and associated events)
Earliest environmental campaigning
Have you ever stopped to think about how the national parks in the Noosa region came to be designated? Their creation was the result of hard work and intensive campaigning sometimes against concerted opposition.
The story of the campaign to establish one of them – the Cooloola National Park – is being told through an exhibition in May and June at Caloundra Regional Gallery. ‘Wild/flower Women II’ takes a look at the role of Kathleen McArthur and Judith Wright, two writers and artists whose creative work extended beyond the arts to tackling major environmental campaigns.
The exhibition shows how the friendship between these women, and a desire to have Australians appreciate the unique wildflowers that grow on our coastal plains, prompted them to become fierce public campaigners who could be ‘wild’ in order to protect ‘the wild’.
Pastoralists turn conservationists
Born just 11 days apart, they shared pastoral family heritages. Kathleen McArthur’s mother was a Durack (her cousin, Mary Durack, wrote ‘Kings in Grass Castles’). Judith Wright hailed from the New England region.
After marriage and three children, Kathleen became a self-taught artist specialising in painting Queensland wildflowers, which she did initially to help her identify them. In 1959, her desire to educate Queenslanders about their own native flowers led to publish the first book focussed entirely on Queensland wildflowers. Subsequent works included ‘Living on the Coast’, ‘The Bush in Bloom’, ‘Bread and Dripping’ and ‘Pumicestone Passage’.
Kathleen established a native plant nursery at her home, ‘Midyim’, in Caloundra. She inaugurated the Sunshine Coast wildflower show in 1967 and this was the foundation of the Sunshine Coast Wildflower Festival which is still held today.
Pioneering campaigners
Judith Wright, best known as one of Australia’s greatest poets, was also a pioneering Aboriginal rights activist and conservationist who played an active role in campaigning for the Cooloola National Park and the Great Barrier Reef. Her connection to the Sunshine Coast was consolidated in 1953, when she purchased a holiday cottage at Boreen Point north of Noosa.
A shared love of the subtle beauty of Queensland’s often overlooked wildflowers led Kathleen, Judith and their families to embark on a ‘wildflowering’ expedition along the coast in 1953.
Climbing to the top of Mt Tinbeerwah they looked north across the untouched plains and coastline stretching north to Double Island Point and Wide Bay and declared that it would make a great national park. Their concerns about the limited knowledge of most Australian children regarding our rich natural heritage led to them forming the Wildlife Preservation Society of Queensland (WPSQ) in 1962 along with naturalist David Fleay and publisher Brian Clouston.
Judith served as the first President and Kathleen was Vice-President before refocussing her efforts back on the coast to form the WPSQ’s Caloundra Branch in 1963.
Major battle to conserve Cooloola
Kathleen and Judith then led one of Australia’s first major conservation battles, creating nationwide public awareness of the existence and special nature of the Cooloola region. Working alongside many others, such as Arthur Harrold (founder of the Noosa Parks Association), they embarked on a 22-year campaign which resulted in the gazettal of Cooloola National Park in 1975.
A highlight of their Cooloola campaigning was the distribution of 100,000 protest cards across Australia, with an estimated 15,000 of them sent to Queensland’s then Premier Joh Bjelke-Petersen. The success of the campaign was more remarkable considering the extreme pro-development politics of Queensland at that time.
An exhibition to honour their work
‘Wild/flower Women II’ builds upon the first exhibition at Noosa Regional Gallery in late 2016-17 and features a selection of Kathleen’s magnificent wildflower paintings, many based on Sunshine Coast flora but also including the work of four contemporary Sunshine Coast artists.
Demonstrating the power of art to inform and inspire, contemporary artists Marvene Ash, Shannon Garson, Anne Harris and Ulrike Sturm pay homage to Kathleen’s earlier work with their own responses to the wildflowers and natural heritage of this region.
‘Wild/flower Women II’ is showing at Caloundra Regional Gallery from 3 May – 17 June 2018. Other initiatives include a one-day symposium on Monday 11 June and a range of workshops and events including an Anywhere Theatre production on Saturday 19 May. For further information about the exhibition and ‘Wild/flower Women II’ activities see https://www.wildflowerwomen.net/ .
The exhibition is supported by CQUniversity Noosa.
