...Creator
Dr Robbie van Hemert
Dr Robbie van Hemert is a research artist. In 2002 she received the Margaret Senior Award for Wildlife Illustration, which was partly sponsored by the National Parks and Wildlife Service, for the educative quality of her work.
Her Rural Biographies (A3 leather-bound journals), which take up to a year in the making, include a visual-documentation of the Packer family's rural property Ellerston, and Kia-ora Thoroughbred Stud, Scone. Ellerston now help sponsor the Majestic Foodplains Project.
Since undertaking her Honours and Masters at Newcastle University, Robbie has developed the concept of Land Biography through PhD research at UNE Armidale. She presented her concept as an artist's talk at her solo exhibition at Tamworth Regional Gallery in May 2009, to a packed and enthusiastic audience.
I wanted to develop my projects from a personal level to a community level."
The 'Majestic Food Plains...A Land Biography' is Robbie's first regional project. It encompasses the geological, farming and historical significance of the Liverpool Plains. The project has expanded to cover an Education Syllabus for Primary School students, 'Food Bowl Connection' and her Sydney presentation of 'Majestic Food Plains...A Land Biography' at the National Trust.
Robbie lives with her family on the 'Liverpool Plains' where she follows her belief that 'Food Source Matters' and continues to develop creative and educational projects to promote the importance of farming and food.
