Whitehaven AGM protest

Whitehaven Coal held it's AGM in Sydney today, and this is what greeted the board and shareholders as they arrived: a reminder that as Whitehaven's share price continues to tumble, coal is a bad investment!

Whitehaven and its controversial Maules Creek coal mine project has long been a target of protest due to the severity of the mine's impacts on Indigenous sacred sites, the Leard State Forest and its endangered flora and fauna, the local farming community, and the climate. 
30 October 2015
text & images: Land Water Future

Battle for Bylong

On the Battle for Bylong weekend of 24-5 October, as well as entertainment in the Bylong sports ground there were highly informative tours of the Bylong valley with Craig Shaw and Nell Schofield who each spoke about about Kepco's plans to mine the Bylong Valley and thereby destroy a community and highly developed and unique agricultural area, as well as contribute to climate change. 

FIVE YEARS LATER

Craig Shaw leading a tour. image: Battle for Bylong

In memory of George Bender

Protest at Origin Energy AGM in Martin Place, Sydney, in memory of George Bender, the NSW farmer who took his own life after a long struggle to stop CSG companies mining his land. Image: land Water Future

Listen to Dr Helen Redmond explaining the health effects of fracking.

PAC Hearing in Singleton - Rio Tinto vs Bulga

WRVAP attended the NSW Planning Assessment Commission hearing on 30 June and 1 July 2015 in the Hunter Valley town of Singleton to hear community response to Rio Tinto's proposed expansion of its open cut mine in the form of its Warkworth  and Mt Thorley 'Continuation Projects'. The audience was packed, and included many who must have rushed straight there from work without having time to remove their orange high vis jackets, and which incidentally had the effect of showing that some locals are employed by the Rio Tinto mine.

PAC Hearing audience, Singleton 30 June 2015. Ph Kate Ausburn

There were nearly two days of 5-minute responses to the proposal to expand the Rio Tinto open cut mine. The PAC heard about the contribution this expansion will make to climate change through the burning of more coal, the impact on traditional owners' responsibility to care for the land, and other damage it will do to the surrounding land, including to rare and unique ecosystems and economic viability of farm businesses. WRVAP contributed two responses—by David Watson and Margaret Roberts.

Uncle Kevin Taggart giving his response to the proposed Rio Tinto expansion. Ph Kate Ausburn

 

Visit to BULGA

On May 25 WRVAP travelled with the NSW community collective, Our Land Our Water Our Future, to Bulga to find out first hand the nature of the threat Rio Tinto is posing to the town and the land. We were given an invaluable tour of the town and area and the opportunity to meet and hear traditional custodians of the land including Wonnarua elder Uncle Kevin Taggart, as well as Bulga residents speak about the impact of the Rio Tinto mining and expansion.

Uncle Kevin Taggart, Wonnarua elder who spoke about the land being destroyed by the Rio Tinto mine in the background. Photo David Watson

As part of its campaign against an open-cut coalmine expansion, Our Land Our Water Our Future has funded and produced this video profiling Uncle Kevin. He and other custodians and Bulga residents, have been fighting for more than five years to stop the expansion by Rio Tinto. They say it will create severe noise and dust pollution, destroy a critically endangered woodland and threaten 110 registered Aboriginal cultural sites. A final decision is expected within weeks.

In the Kandos Scout Hall for Cementa15

The Kandos Scout Hall

see more

The WRVAP Instruments of Democracy performance focuses on the metal lock-on equipment used as 'instruments of democracy' by many insightful and courageous people from all walks of life across NSW. Performed twice-daily during Cementa15, it is a 5 minute performance that bears witness to the non-violent direct action against open cut and coal seam gas mining that is spreading across NSW. 

 see more on Cementa15 site

Instruments of Democracy also included individual works by members of the WRVAP:

L-R: Suzanne Bartos; David Watson; Noelene Lucas & Juliet Fowler Smith
with cardboard lock-ons in the centre

L: Suzanne Bartos, centre + top: David Watson; R: Noelene Lucas

David Watson Checkout + Ransom Note (with Denise Corrigan) 
(powerpoint on screen), Australian Navigators 
(photographs) with performance images in front

Noelene Lucas Death by Coal video, with blackboard drawing behind
and performance objects in front

Juliet Fowler Smith Barking Owls and Weeping Woodlands
 with performance object in front

performance metal lock-ons  

top: David Watson Koala Diplomacy (2015) prayer flags;
 L: Juliet Fowler Smith; R: Toni Warburton

front: cardboard performance objects; centre floor: Margaret Roberts;
 top R:Toni Warburton AgitPots H2O (2015) clay and ceramic 

Margaret Roberts Life4Coal piled tuille cut-outs of
threatened species.  photo Jessica Maurer

Sue Callanan Breath by Degrees (2015) coal, felt
photo Jessica Maurer

Suzanne Bartos Another Meeting Pool (after Merlyn Skipper) puppets

photos by David Watson except where otherwise stated

 See also: Cementa15,  c/- Maria Miranda, c/- Gina Fairley, c/- The Mudgee Guardian,

and thankyou Fleur for your wonderful images and commentary on Sixtoeight.net

Instruments of Democracy at Cementa15

DOWNLOAD CATALOGUE PDF

The Williams River Valley Artists’ Project will present Instruments of Democracy in Cementa15 at the Kandos Scout Hall, open 10am to 4pm, 9–12 April 2015

At 10am and 2pm each day WRVAP’s project is animated by Instruments of Democracy, a performance work that takes on the role of witness to non-violent direct action. The piece has been developed over six months through workshopping our responses to the courage, ingenuity, discipline and stamina of environmental activists—from all walks of life—who oppose the terrible impacts of open-cut and long wall coal mining, and CSG/fracking. Vast environmental destruction is wreaked by large corporations that do not have the right to misuse, contaminate and deplete our ground water, destroy forests and natural habitats, and fray the social fabric of farming communities. When government fails, people act: urgent concern about the future is driving a new form of democracy. Instruments of Democracy is inspired by this development, especially by the the art-like actions using lock-on devices that we witnessed in the Leard, Newcastle and Gloucester blockades. It was also prompted by a performance that also bears witness—An Immaterial Retrospective of the Venice Biennale by Alexandra Pirici & Manuel Pelmuș—that was seen by WRVAP artists in Venice in 2013. 

Alongside the collaborative Instruments of Democracy performance, there are individual artworks by WRVAP artists:

•Suzanne Bartos Another Meeting Pool (after Merlyn Skipper) (2015) puppets

• Neil Berecry-Brown Social Licence (2013) text

• Sue Callanan Breath by Degrees (2015) coal, felt

• Juliet Fowler Smith Barking Owls and Weeping Woodlands (2015) drawing on paper, mixed media

• Noelene Lucas Death by Coal (2015) video

• Margaret Roberts Life 4 Coal (2015) floor cut-outs

• Toni Warburton AgitPots H2O (2015) clay and ceramic

• David Watson Australian Navigators (2015) photographs, Koala Diplomacy (2015) prayer flags, Checkout + Ransom Note (with Denise Corrigan) (2013) powerpoint

WVRAP would like to acknowledge and thank the Rev Peter Green and  Silver Street Baptist Mission Marrickville for providing access to facilities to help us develop this project.