The Bimblebox Art Project:

The Bimblebox Art Project is the brainchild of artist Jill Sampson. Begun April 2012, Jill has worked across the project throughout this past decade and continues, with Bimblebox 153 Birds, into the future.  The Bimblebox Art Project is now a ten year story of fossil fuel, a nature refuge and a planet in climate emergency.

The projects purpose is to creatively engage with and document the Bimblebox Nature Refuge, a protected environment that is NOT protected from and is subsequently threatened by coal mining. The first step was to develop artist camps on the nature refuge bringing artists, writers, photographers and other creatives into a direct, on site experience of place. From the earliest, exhibitions were envisaged and began to be developed.

The Bimblebox Art Project aims to engage, educate and engender people’s connection with Bimblebox; to take the Bimblebox Nature Refuge beyond the fence-line and bring an experience of it to people throughout Australia; to build an understanding of the value of natural environments like Bimblebox; to engage in conversations around climate change, coal mining, biodiversity and what value we place on water, land and the environment.

Art, science, nature camps, touring exhibitions, writing, music, various events, artist books, education kits, creative activities for children, panel discussions, a printed exhibition catalogue, media exposure, a digital catalogue app and academic research have been some of the outcomes.

Through the Bimblebox Art Project a large body of cultural material, creative responses and artworks that have extended beyond the fence-line of the Nature Refuge have been facilitated and produced. The Bimblebox Art Project has brought a remote vibrant wildlife refuge alive for audiences. It has touched the lives of people across Australia and, via participation and digital media, the world.

The exhibition installation Bimblebox 153 Birds is currently touring and available to galleries.

State Library of Queensland collection:

Ephemera from the Bimblebox Art Project has been collected by the State Library of Queensland, while this website has been included in the Pandora archive.
The State Library has also collected two artist books relating to the Bimblebox Art Project, including:
Poems for Bimblebox, September 2013, Beth Jackson; Louis Lim binder
Bimblebox Art Project: what’s yours is my coal mine/edited by Cain & Todd Hunter, Gerald Soworka; Townsville, Qld.: Hunter Bros Press; 2013

Exhibitions developed by the Bimblebox Art Project:

• Document://Bimblebox, 2013, Sawtoth ARI, Launceston Tasmania.
• National Touring exhibition:  Bimblebox: art – science – nature, 2014 – 2017
• Available for Touring:  Bimblebox 153 Birds, first exhibited in 2015, developed for touring 2019.

Other Exhibitions:

Participants at the art, science, nature camps have also developed their own exhibitions of artwork from their experiences of the Bimblebox Nature Refuge
Bimblebox MMXIV, 2015, group exhibition organised by Greg and Emma Harm, at Ipswich Community Gallery.
Bimblebox to Gum Creek, 2017, Graydon Gallery, Jennifer Stuerzl, solo exhibition, Graydon Gallery.
Ripple Effects, 2018, artists Jennifer Stuerzl, Rosie Lloyd-Giblett, Beth Jackson at Gympie Regional Gallery.
Michael Foley: The Long View, 2018, Michael Foley, Caloundra Regional Gallery. A posthumous exhibition of watercolours by Michael Foley, curated by Beth Jackson. Included seven watercolours Foley produced at the Bimblebox Nature Refuge.

Artist Judith Sinnamon travelled independently to Bimblebox Nature Refuge, resulting in the following exhibition:
Bimblebox, 2018, Judith Sinnamon, solo exhibition at Edwina Corlette Gallery.

The Bimblebox Art Project has also inspired other projects:

Artist from the Bunbury region developed the exhibition Transplanting Disobedience to coincide with the exhibiting of Bimblebox: art – science – nature at the Bunbury Regional Art Gallery. After viewing the exhibitions local artists developed the exhibition, Artists at the Helm.
Transplanting Disobedience, 2014, an art exhibition that focused on the local coal mining impacts around Bunbury, Western Australia.
Artists at the Helm, 2014/2015 advocating protection for a local native forest block, Bunbury, Western Australia.

Bimblebox Art Project has participated in two research projects.

Scroll further for an overview of the Bimblebox Nature Refuge and the art, science, nature camps.

On this website:

• About Bimblebox Nature Refuge
• Bimblebox 153 Birds Exhibition
• Education Resource Bimblebox 153 Birds
• art, science, nature camps on Bimblebox
• Exhibitions
  • Bimblebox: art – science – nature
  •  Document://Bimblebox
  • Bimblebox 153 Birds Exhibition
• Jill Sampson, coordinator Bimblebox Art Project
• Academic Research
• In the media
  • Connections to Bimblebox Art Project
• Contact
• Moving Images

fb: Bimblebox 153 Birds
Insta:
@Bimblebox153
@Bimblebox_Nature_Refuge
@Jill_Sampson_Artist

The Bimblebox Nature Refuge:

The Bimblebox Nature Refuge is an 8000 hectare area of diverse woodland in the desert uplands region of central western Queensland. Bimblebox is protected in perpetuity by a Nature Refuge Agreement with the Queensland State Government. Shockingly nature refuges are not protected from mining.  Waratah Coal plan to develop the Galilee Coal project, a thermal coal mine that would have a devastating impact on the Bimblebox Nature Refuge.

“The proposed mine would produce 40 million tonnes per annum of thermal coal over a life of 25-30 years, generating around 2.9 billion tonnes of greenhouse gas emissions, inconsistent with the aims of the Paris Agreement to constrain climate change.” Environmental Defenders Office (article here)

Understanding the proposed mining developments for the Galilee Basin has brought a realisation of the greater threat to life on Earth from generated carbon emissions if the Galilee Basin is developed for thermal coal export.  As well as an understanding of the extensive and irreversible impact of large scale coal mining on groundwater reserves, ecosystems and agriculture.

At Present the Carmichael Coal Mine, Bravus (Adani Group), is the one thermal coal mine to develop to production in the Galilee Basin. But Waratah Coal have applied for their final mining approvals for the Galilee Coal Project, the mine that would impact the Bimblebox Nature Refuge. The Bimblebox Alliance, Youth Verdict and others lodged objections generating a Land Court of Queensland case that began on 19 April, 2022. EDO press release here.

The Bimblebox Nature Refuge combines thriving vibrant ecosystems with sustainable beef production.  On Bimblebox both conservation and agriculture work together generating research projects in biodiversity and sustainable land management practices.

For more information on the Bimblebox Nature Refuge, go here.
For the Bimblebox Nature Refuge website go here.

The camps on Bimblebox:

Bimblebox Art, Science, Nature Camps:
Bringing artists onto the Bimblebox Nature Refuge and then developing this work into a touring exhibition were the initial aims for the Bimblebox Art Project.

The Bimblebox art, science, nature camps returned in September 2022.

Diverse groups gathered annually at the Bimblebox Nature Refuge each September from 2012 – 2017.  The 2018 camp was cancelled due to deepening drought conditions at that time. At each camp the artists, writers, creatives would explore, make and develop work that in its own way distils and documents the Bimblebox NR environment. The work creatively explores this place, is an archive of this threatened environment and makes comment on issues such as biodiversity loss, food security, water use and climate change while celebrating the vibrancy of life that currently thrives on the Bimblebox Nature Refuge.

Through their artworks the artists have explored the material, visual, historical, scientific and physical existence of the Bimblebox Nature Refuge while asking our community and our society as a whole what the future holds for this nature refuge and what human and societal value we place on it.