Bethamy Linton

Birds Rained

In February 2021, the Woorooloo fires swept through the our Perth Hills community searing through 10,900 hectares of land and destroying 86 homes. For weeks after the fires were extinguished shots rang through the air, as countless wounded animals found their way to edge of the burn scar and were euthanised.

Two years on, time has worked it’s magic on the ever-resilient landscape, new growth slowly eclipsing the scorched blacks. While amongst us some still deal with the reality of re-building their homes, most of the community has put the fires behind them. The experience, however, lives on in all of us as visual reminders in the landscape caution vigilance and care.

‘Birds Rained’ is a series of small sculptural objects in lace cut titanium and silver that depict the skulls and skeletons of native animals endemic to the affected area of the Darling Scarp. In the tradition of reliquaries and religious objects I imagine them as objects of mourning, mementoes, even artefacts of a crumbling civilisation.