Reclaim the Void hits halfway mark with 1500 rugs in the bag

The art project to cover a Goldfields mine hole with handmade rugs has progressed to the halfway stage and is set to be completed by the end of 2024.

Conceptual artist Vivienne Robertson told the Kalgoorlie Miner she had received close to 1500 rugs in total, and was aiming for 3000 rugs before joining them together.

The project aims to provide healing by encouraging people to make a rug, which will be placed with others to create an Aboriginal artwork by Dolly Walker to cover a mining hole.

“Of those I’ve catalogued 850 and the others are sitting in piles waiting for me to catalogue them,” Ms Robertson said.

“We’ve got about 65 schools who are engaged in the project across Australia.”

She said there were also workshops taking place in Japan, and at two museums in the United States.

“We were at a conference on Friday last week in America via Zoom. So that’s really lovely to be receiving invitations for conferences to talk about the project,” Ms Robertson said.

However, she said despite knowing the rug would cover a mining hole in the Goldfields, exactly which hole it would be had yet to be decided.

“The exhibition will go ahead and the WA Museum Boola Bardip in Perth next year, and we think that we’ll start the assemblage next year,” Ms Robertson said.

“The design will be based on original painting by artist Dolly Walker, that’s Kado Muir’s mother.”

She said rug-making workshops would take place in Leonora in September, and workshops were continuing at Goldfields Arts Centre and Museum of the Goldfields.