Images taken after the Canberra Fires 2003

Image taken after the canberra Fires of 2003Image taken after the canberra Fires of 2003Image taken after the canberra Fires of 2003Image taken after the canberra Fires of 2003Image taken after the canberra Fires of 2003Image taken after the canberra Fires of 2003Image taken after the canberra Fires of 2003Image taken after the canberra Fires of 2003 Image taken after the canberra Fires of 2003 Image taken after the canberra Fires of 2003Image taken after the canberra Fires of 2003Image taken after the canberra Fires of 2003Image taken after the canberra Fires of 2003Image taken after the canberra Fires of 2003Image taken after the canberra Fires of 2003Image taken after the canberra Fires of 2003Image taken after the canberra Fires of 2003Image taken after the canberra Fires of 2003Image taken after the canberra Fires of 2003Image taken after the canberra Fires of 2003Image taken after the canberra Fires of 2003Image taken after the canberra Fires of 2003Image taken after the canberra Fires of 2003Image taken after the canberra Fires of 2003

After the fires in Canberra on January 18 2003 I spent a few hours each day taking photos of the devastation around me. I took hundreds of photos in the months afterwards and since I am not a photographer could not make sense of why I had to walk and walk and walk the district every day. One morning I realised that this activity was me trying to make sense of the experience and there is simply no way to make sense of the tragedy. Four people died a horrible death, nearly 500 houses were lost, 2000 gardens were lost, a forest was lost and Canberra was changed forever. With the exception of family snap shots of our own garden recovering. I haven’t taken a photo in the district since that morning.

These are a few images from the many films I exposed during that period. There was a painful exquisite beauty in some of the textures discovered on those mornings. Images of peoples burnt out houses I have not put online as I felt that each home has its own story and placing them online was an invasion of their lives at a time when residents of Weston creek were trying to recover from horror.