The Ox Team

Texture has always been a feature in my art work and this one is no exception. The trees and bush surrounding the image are made from wool needle felt and textured yarn

This was a family piece that was a bit scary to contemplate. My great grandfather and his three sons farmed in the Oparau area and had to clear some land that was covered in trees to get timber for building on the farm - we are talking around the 1930s here. They worked with old fashioned axes and used a bullock team to drag the trees out of the bush to where they could be milled for building. As long as I can remember a photo of the four of them with the bullock team has hung somewhere in the house. With the magic of digital reproduction I now have my own copy of the original photo which hangs in the dining room. It is a bit of a daunting operation to replicate that photo but it was a heritage task.

The men are predominantly thread sketched, the bullocks have more detail added with thread paint. This is a very early thread paint and is quite painterly in its effect. The background is machine quilted