helen earl australian ceramic artist

The seed hunters sweep the earth searching for tiny unassuming seeds, mere specks in the vast geopgraphy of the earth's territory. The seed hunters must seek out those hard to reach, dusty corners where ancient varieties of seed (landrace) have survived and are adapted to survive in the harshest of extremes of heat and cold.

This series of work is based on the documentary by Sally Ingleton, Seed Hunter, screened on ABC TV in 2008, featuring Dr Ken Street, an Australian scientist and an aspect of his working life. The documentary was about his trip to Tajikistan with a small team of scientists and an Australian wheat farmer in search of landrace varieties of chickpea and wheat.

A broom object incorporating the gesture of sweeping seemed an apt metaphor fot the collecting strategies of the seed hunter. The dustpan objects symbolises the collection of seed from hard-to-reach corners of the earth. The chickpea dustpan is my conceptual response too the difficulty Dr Street faced finding landrace chickpea varieties.