The empty wharf 2007 oil on canvas

1 -14 December 2007 The National Trust Centre, Observatory Hill, Sydney Monday - Friday: 9 - 5pm Saturdays & Sundays: 12 noon - 5pm Enquires: (02)9258 0123.

Well-known Sydney artist Jane Bennett will be exhibiting her latest show Trains, Cranes & Ships: Eveleigh Railway Workshops and the Hungry Mile at the National Trust Centre from 1-14 December, 2007.

For more than 20 years, the West Pymble artist has been capturing the city’s rapidly vanishing industrial heritage, setting up her easel on wharves, sheds and demolition sites to record the dying moments of ‘heritage gems’ like working ports, shipyards and railway sheds.

Jane’s most recent paintings focus on the Eveleigh Railway Workshops in Redfern, the Hammerhead Crane at Garden Island and the Hungry Mile at East Darling Harbour. “This exhibition is about the end of an era – the transformation of neglected industrial heritage in Sydney. It explores areas that share a fascinating past and an uncertain future,” she said.

Jane’s exhibition with the Trust is timely as the NSW Trust recommended the Eveleigh Workshops and Hammerhead Crane go on a national ‘Heritage at Risk’ list earlier this year, (an initiative organised by the Australian Council of National Trusts). These two places were accepted by the Canberra Trust on its ‘top 10 at risk list’ last week, said the Trust’s Mara Barnes, who is coordinating the exhibition.

“The harbour’s tugboats and cargo ships have almost vanished, leaving the wharves and buildings along the Hungry Mile looking like a ghost town. Over at the Eveleigh Railway sheds, the history of steam has similarly puffed out with the loss of the 3801 from the Large Erecting Shed. It is sad because it didn’t have to be this way,” said Mara. “Jane is the only artist I know of who is capturing Sydney’s vanishing industrial history like this. Her work is of enormous cultural and historical significance to our city and soon it will be the only way to learn something of our vibrant industrial heritage.”

Jane is also the only artist who has gained access to paint these sites, often setting up her easel very close to the action. She has an amazing ability to see past the grim clanking machinery and dirty buildings that others see. Trains, cranes and ships is a pleasing mix of contrasts. The worn surfaces and eerie lighting of the cavernous Large Erecting Shop at Eveleigh contrast with the intense colours, clouds and geometry found at the Hungry Mile and Hammerhead Crane.

At Eveleigh, Jane has painted a series of interiors of the Large Erecting Shop with light shafts revealing rows of historic diesel and steam trains in the shadows. Some of the paintings depict the loving care of workers and volunteers as they hose, scrub and refuel the trains.

Jane’s paintings of wharves at Millers Point, commonly known as the Hungry Mile, are extremely moving. In this exhibition, she has contrasted her paintings of the area as a working port with the bustling activity of trucks, forklifts, cranes and ships with paintings of the eerie emptiness of the same place just a few weeks later.

“As the wharf becomes a ghost town, I have been painting evocative relics from ‘dead house 1 and 2,’ wooden tally boxes used to keep records before the days of computers; trolleys used to lug wool bales before containers were invented and hooks for rolling timber that although still being used in the late 1970s, looked more like artefacts from the early Iron Age. Two centuries of maritime history have come to an end.”

“I feel that the timing of this exhibition could not be more ironic as the Hungry Mile is empty and abandoned and the process is beginning at Eveleigh as many trains, carriages and other machinery have already been removed,” she concluded. Trains, Cranes & Ships – Eveleigh Railway Workshops and the Hungry Mile can be seen in the Annie Wyatt Room and Board Room of the National Trust Centre, Observatory Hill, during regular business hours. The exhibition will also be open from 12 noon to 5 pm on the weekends between the 1 and 14 December. Jane’s artwork is available for purchase, with proceeds going to fund the Trust’s advocacy work. Admission is free to the exhibition.

The National Trust is well-known for its campaigns and has begun collaborating with artists in recent years to focus public attention on heritage that is at risk through art exhibitions. Topics have ranged recently from industrial heritage to historic gates and trees.

For more information please call the National Trust Centre on 02)9258 0123.