Rangelands Revealed — Galah Earrings

Sterling silver earrings, oxidised, with an organically shaped section removed from each edge. On the opposite side of each oval the edge is stitched in an irregular border of musk pink silk thread. The gently convex design includes a sparse, asymmetrical pattern of raised dots. The earrings hang from handmade sterling silver hooks. People who wear pink are usually up for some fun – just like our feathered friends the galah! These birds with their pink and grey feathers are found throughout the rangelands in Australia, and often near water. In Ngiyampaa language of the Pilaarrkiyalu people, the Traditional Custodians of country between Cobar and Ivanhoe in New South Wales, the galah is called ‘kilaa’. They move in flocks of 10-15 birds, but sometimes they converge in much greater numbers to collaborate. For example, they will start amassing along a wire suspended across a waterhole, calling to other galahs to join them so that their increasing weight gradually lowers the line towards the surface of the water. Only once a couple of birds have taken a sip, the entire flock will simultaneously fly off the wire, before a couple of birds return to begin the process all over again. Endless fun!

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Kate Gardiner handcrafts jewellery in tribute to the rangelands of Western NSW, and she is based on Ngunnawal and Ngambri Country/Canberra. Though her practice, Kate creates pieces that are a distillation of the colours and the small and large features of the rangelands. Her focus includes the curving ridgelines of sandstone that extent for kilometres through the landscape, the red sandy-loam soil, as well as tiny fragments of tree bark and the brilliant stars that blanket the night sky. Kate was a successful entrant in the Emerging Artist Category of 'The Earring Show' 2023, Craft Council of British Columbia, Canada, and she is a successful entrant to the upcoming exhibition 'Pin 9', being held in August 2023 at the Australian National Capital Artists Gallery, Canberra.

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Material:  sterling silver, musk-pink coloured silk, liver-of-sulphur, wax.

Dimensions:  4 x 2.5 x 0.5cm