Bridget Baskerville

4. Bridget Baskerville, East Boyd Bay, 2024, corroded brass, 25 x 10 cm (each). NFS

These brass plates have been submerged in salt water from East Boyd Bay, Yuin Country (Eden), a stretch of water utilised by the logging industry. This process of corroding metal plates in bodies of water impacted by human intervention serves to emphasise the agency of water and non-human entities within these controlled systems. This is evidenced by the texture and marks of corrosion that develop on the plate's surface. During this process the brass plates are also etched with the artist’s fingerprints, acting as a visual reminder that human bodies are also bodies of water.

Bridget Baskerville is an early career artist, based between Canberra (Ngunawal Ngambri Country) and her hometown of Kandos, NSW (Dabee Wiradjuri Country). Baskerville works across media such as printmaking, installation, photography, and video. Through the themes of community, history, time and ecology, Baskerville’s work examines socio-environmental issues faced in regional Australia, looking at human impact on place and the relationship between extractive industries and water. Her practice is informed by her experience of growing up in a mining family in regional Australia.