Yasmin Smith, Stars (Castle Hill Plantation 2021), 2021, phase one: plaster moulds of plantation floor; phase two: stoneware with leaf-fall ash-glaze, stoneware slip with spotted gum ash-glazes , dimensions variable to site; phase one: 260 plaster moulds, each 15 x 15cm, overall 400 x 240cm; phase two: 260 tiles, each 15 x 15cm, 9 ceramic tree sections, dimensions variable , TCG22429
(photo: Luc Remond) Collection: Powerhouse Museum, Sydney

Commissioned by Powerhouse Museum for the exhibition Eucalyptusdom, 2021

Artist statement:

This site-derived installation is produced exclusively from materials collected from the museum of Applied Arts and Sciences’ former eucalypt research plantation on Bidjigal land at Castle Hill. the work is concieved in two phases, with the second phase to be installed in Spring. Inorganic elements of a tree derived from the soil and water that nourish it remain in its cellular fibre after death. These glazes reflect trace metals retained by the plantation leaf-fall and one burnt eucalypt. A shifting spectrum of colour grows like an apparition of the gum tree. A manifestation of the tree’s own memory – its physical, biological and chemical essence. Humans also retain trace elements from the universe. We are all literally made of stardust.