Beyond Measure

Incinerator Gallery

14October - 3 December

2016

My work Beyond Measure was selected as a finalist in the The Incinerator Art Award - Art for Social Change.

Here Bethany Wheeler uses natural forms to create a visual  metaphor for the pressures that we are putting on the environment. She  contrasts her poetic metaphor with a direct quote from Tim Flanery:“If  seaweed farms covered 9% of the ocean they could produce enough  biomethane to replace all of today’s needs in fossil fuel energy, while  removing 53 gigatonnes of CO2 (about the same as all current human  emissions) per year from the atmosphere. It could also increase  sustainable fish production to provide 200kg per year, per person, for  10 billion people. Additional benefits include reduction in ocean  acidification and increased ocean primary productivity and biodiversity.  Many of the technologies required to achieve 

this are already in widespread use, if at a comparatively minuscule scale.” - Tim Flannery, The Atmosphere of Hope

Aesthetics In A Time Of Emergency explores current social issues,  such as nuclear disasters and climate change, and its impact on  humanity. 

Nadia Mercuri, Jasmine Targett, Sarah Field, Jennifer King & Bethany Wheeler.

A paradigm of water + compassion 

Living our future in the present, an insensitive and opaque way of  thinking about the consequences of decisions seems to guide society –  blind sighted and void of tolerance. Concepts of societal compassion  fatigue are explored through socio-political irony and metaphors for  me-now materialism.  Focusing on our relationship with the waters that  surround us, and our perception of ownership pertaining to this  environment, these works attempt to make sense of the world around us,  reflected by a thread common to us all. 

Virtuoso, featured work by nine of  Australia’s most talented and inspiring glass makers – Lisa Cahill,  Matthew Curtis, Benjamin Edols, Kathy Elliott, Brenden Scott French,  Holly Grace, Ruth McCallum-Howell, Bethany Wheeler and Nick Wirdnam.

The exhibition was opened by Simon Warrender, Executive Director and Founder of the Melbourne Prize Trust.