RMIT PhD Milestone 2 (half way)

Over the weekend I flew to Melbourne to deliver my second milestone for my PhD research through RMIT university.

This milestone marks the halfway point of my research. For this I submitted a summary of the work I’ve completed so far and delivered a presentation to a panel with a question and answer session.

After three years (part time) of work, it is wonderful to know that I passed the milestone. And I’m really excited to see where the research heads to from here.

Photograph by Thom Stuart. Kathleen McArthur Reserve, Post-fire

Walking-with: A study of the use of walking, noticing, observing, and drawing as method, in the creation of botanical as place in design and the unearthing of the notion of walking-with, through the lenses of phenomenology and ecofeminism.

ABSTRACT

This practice-based research explores the act of walking, noticing, observing, and drawing as method in the creation of botanicals in design through the lenses of phenomenology and ecofeminism.

Through this research a series of bushwalks alone or accompanied by artists, makers and researchers tred the path of inquiry through the habitat of the Wallum coastal heathland in Southern Queensland and Northern New South Wales. These walks have informed depictions of botanicals endemic to this habitat for a surface patterning practice.

In doing so this research asks the question; how has observation and walking as method been explored in my surface patterning practice to contribute to the notion of walking-with, a method of walking alongside others in real or imagined spaces, as a means of informing, examining, and sharing experience.