Please join us to celebrate the launch of Fallen Leaves at Namadgi Visitor Centre.

About the Launch | Saturday 6 December 2025
Artist Talk | from 11am
Official Launch | from 11.30am
Location | Namadgi Visitor Centre, Naas Rd, Tharwa ACT 2620

About the Artwork
Fallen Leaves was commissioned by Craft + Design Canberra in partnership with ACT Parks and Conservation. This site-specific artwork by Canberra-based artists Rebecca Selleck, responds to the theme “Fire in the Landscape” and is a reflection on the evolving impact of climate change and the increasing severity of weather events in the ACT region.

Artwork Statement
The Orroral Valley bushfire was so big and close we could see it from our backyard. I had my newborn in my arms. I could feel the thousands of choked breaths and splintering of great limbs as ecosystems collapsed. I was scared for my child’s future. For all our kids’ futures. 
 
The land wasn’t recognisable. The fires were so hot they destroyed too much. But still the charred eucalypts shot out their epicormic growth. Along with other devastating fires around Australia, the Orroral Valley fire was the catalyst for intensifying conversations across the country around climate change and human impact. 
 
For those of us who choose to remember, we go on with sorrow in our hearts and hope for the future. This artwork is a reminder. On a granite boulder, a child lays, tenderly touching the hand of a kangaroo joey. These figures are both at rest, facing towards Mount Tennent. Curved over them is the blackened bronze form of a burnt young eucalypt still in the act of sheltering, and below their young leaves form a glistening bed. 

Artist Biography
Rebecca Selleck is a Canberra-based artist with a focus on sculpture and interactive installation, blending furniture, casting, assemblage, soft sculpture and animatronics. She completed her Bachelor of Visual Arts at the ANU School of Art with First Class Honours, majoring in Sculpture and Art Theory and also holds a Bachelor of Communications, majoring in Creative Writing and Literary Studies. She uses her practice to reciprocally investigate and challenge her own perceptions within a culture of conflicting truths, her work overlays time and place to express the need for human accountability and the painful complexities of animal and environmental ethics in Australia.

Rebecca is the recipient of multiple awards, including the prestigious Peter and Lena Karmel Anniversary Prize for best graduating student at the ANU School of Art, and the 2023 Lake Light Sculpture Major Prize. She has exhibited across Australia and internationally. She was a finalist in the inaugural 2017 Ramsay Art Prize at the Art Gallery of South Australia and in 2018 the Arte Laguna Prize in Venice, Italy; the Macquarie Art Prize; the Ravenswood Art Prize (Highly Commended); and the Churchie Art Prize. She participated in the 2022 Adelaide Biennial at the Art Gallery of South Australia and toured nationally in the Experimenta: Lifeforms – International Triennial of Media Art. Her work is held in public collections including the Art Gallery of South Australia, Art Gallery of New South Wales, Museum of Australian Democracy, Western Plains Cultural Centre, Bendigo Art Gallery, and Shepparton Art Museum.

Contact the host of Launch + Artist Talk | Fallen Leaves

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