Description / Inspiration

Komorebi is a Japanese word which translates as, ‘sunlight filtering through the leaves on trees’.

In reference to the koala’s forest habitat up high in trees, to see a koala for yourself requires you to also enjoy komorebi – looking up into the sunlight filtered by the leaves on trees.

This design also recognises the Sister City relationship of Port Macquarie-Hastings with Handa, Japan.

Artist Biography

My art has been described as ‘symbolist’ and explores an ongoing love of nature & a sense of possibility. Featuring food, plants, creatures, trees, full moons, playfullness and zen stillness. I create through meditation to inspire people to reconnect with the natural world around them; with their sense of hope; to appreciate nature’s quiet beauty; to become sensitively aware of other ways of being and
interconnectedness. If we slow down to notice, to tune in, life can be wonderful, brighter, calmer.

“If we are to make the shift from an industrial growth society to a life-sustaining society there are three spheres of action. Holding actions. These activities include all the political, legislative, and legal
work required to reduce the destruction, as well as direct actions-blockades, boycotts, civil disobedience, and other forms of refusal. Work of this kind buys time.

Creation of structural alternatives, the new way of doing things and organising. New ways of growing food, of measuring prosperity, new forms of education.

But these new structures cannot take root and survive unless they are deeply rooted in our values; in our belief in what is worthwhile; in our assumptions about the nature of reality. You can call this a shift in
consciousness.” – Joanna Macy

It is in this third sphere of action that my work belongs. To heal the separation between nature and humans. To open us up to new ways of perceiving the world.

The koala is a very special animal to Australians. I don’t think we can imagine not having them. Our tourism industry heavily promotes our unique animals like koalas, yet most people would be unaware that the koala is almost endangered.

For the past few years, I have been involved in Community Koala Surveys and the Koala Tree Parents program, both in Bongil Bongil National Park near Coffs Harbour (I am based in Bellingen). These are both hands on positive contributions towards keeping the koala in existence.

The Hello Koalas Sculpture Trail is a way for me to help get the message to a lot of people. Please – don’t let the koala go the way of the thylacine.

Don’t let them be declared endangered before you start keeping their habitat trees. Koalas are in peril now. If we keep cutting down their trees it will be too late.