By CASEY NEILL
AN ART installation is linking refugee and migrant women in more ways than one.
Artist Eddy Carroll facilitated The Night Sky during a residency at Heritage Hill Museum and Historic Gardens.
She worked with Wellsprings for Women group Creative Connections Through Craft to create a metaphorical constellation, with lines between each star connecting each participants’ journey.
“I was interested in how we all tell stories via the night sky,” Ms Carroll said.
“It’s the one thing very human has in common.”
She asked each person to interpret a star in their own way with their own technique.
“They all have varying degrees of English,” she said.
“The sky’s a pretty common symbol.
“It’s a universal symbol across cultures.”
She said they all had varying degrees of craft ability – some were just learning, while some were returning to a comfortable memory.
“They’re missing their homeland so they want to return to some of the things that would have been part of the social group in their homeland,” she said.
“As we had our sessions together, I learned how to communicate with each woman individually and get their story about how they came to Melbourne.
“I cut out each star that they sewed and then I made a constellation of stars from each place that they went to.”
Many had spent time on Christmas Island and in Sri Lanka on their journey to Australia.
“The Tibetans walked from Tibet to Nepal to India,” she said.
“Those were the kinds of things were talking about as we were sewing.”
“I felt validated and strengthened by them and their stories.
“I was the one on the receiving end of learning.”
Ms Carroll said the women were also battling bureaucracy.
“That took up a lot of their time and our conversation,” she said.
“The system has been made difficult for them.
“They have constant problems with Centrelink. That I felt really frustrated by.”
She has travelled extensively for more than 20 years.
“I’d meet Aussies that would go to London or Bangkok and they’d freak out at all the people and go home,” she said.
“They’ve got the freedom to be able to get on that plane and go home.
“These people don’t.
“They’re freaking out, but they don’t have the option to go home.”
Ms Carroll said sewing was often feminised and not taken seriously.
“What I realised was how important it was across cultures,” she said.
“We were doing the healing in the action of sewing.
“We were mending.”
The Night Sky is on display at Heritage Hill Museum and Historic Gardens, 66 McCrae Street, Dandenong, until 31 August.
