THE PILLIGA

In October 2018 we travelled to The Pilliga, on Gamilaraay country, to explore, listen, learn and record, in a period of intense drought.

We were first inspired to travel to the Pilliga following a trip Adam and Jim made to the area... they were stunned by its rich avian sonoverse and shocked by the proximity of gas fields.

In heading out there as a large group, our intention was to explore acoustically diverse environments at various times of day, and hopefully feature the sounds of the amazing birdlife, which is under continuous threat from the mining/fracking projects in the area.

21 or so Splinters spent 5 days and nights on the edge of the Pilliga Nature Reserve. We spent the most time playing in and around our base at Eagle Valley; in gullies, over creek beds, in vast fields and splayed across rocky walls. We took a tour of the Sandstone Caves with Gamilaraay artist and ranger Brett Ashby who gave us permission to play there as the sun set. At the Dandry Gorge we employed our choreographed methods to play and make recordings on multiple machines over a large area, navigating our way down stream along the dried up river bed. We played back this recording, "Dandry Flow," over 8 speakers at the Black Box Series, UNSW Art & Design in November 2018.