Workshop: Bush Jewellery with Debra Beale

Join Debra Beale as she shares technical knowledge and cultural connections to Country through participatory workshops in bush jewellery making.

Using native flowers, seeds, leaves and natural materials, participants will be guided on how to assemble, secure and design original pieces of wearable art. Every participant will have the opportunity to create 2–5 pieces of jewellery.

Debra Beale is a multidisciplinary designer and artist whose work celebrates her connection to Gadigal Country, to her mother’s bloodlines from the Palawa and Yorta Yorta Nations, and to her father’s bloodlines from the Wonnarua and Gamilaraay Nations. She works across fashion, textiles, jewellery, painting, sculpture, photography, ceramics, and furniture, to connect cultural knowledge with contemporary media. Debra’s practice speaks to the ongoing impacts of the Stolen Generation, the mistreatment of Aboriginal people in police custody, and layers of intergenerational trauma. Her process is grounded in gathering sustainable and natural materials as a form of healing, and a way to make spiritual connections with her Country, Ancestors, and inner self.

Presented in conjunction with 'barangga: First Nations Design' at UNSW Galleries, 17 June – 30 July 2023. Explore the full program

Photograph by Anna Kučera