My Mother's Keeper by Karla Dickens

My Mother’s Keeper will feature a film and a series of new photographs produced as a result of a collaboration between the artist Karla Dickens and writer Bruce Pascoe. Initiated by the Kandos School of Cultural Adaptation, the work focusses on the urgent need for us to protect and conserve the land and our environment. This important new body of work will be shown at Linden New Art for the first time.

Over two days, Dickens worked with Blacklock Media to make a film of Pascoe walking through Gamilaaraay Country near the town of Bingara in the north-east of NSW. Walking alongside Pascoe are a group of Aboriginal primary school.

children from Bingara Central School. The children represent the next generation, who must be equipped with the right skills and knowledge to implement positive changes to continue to be successful custodians of the land.

Pascoe and the children are wearing capes, made by Dickens, with words such as ‘listen’ and ‘culture’, embroidered onto them. The words on the capes denote the things that will be of vital importance in countering the current environmental crisis. The full set of capes will also feature in the exhibition.