The Journey by Danny Eastwood
The Journey, a ground painting by Danny Eastwood, is a vibrant and detailed depiction of the rich history of the Sisters of Mercy Parramatta. It was designed specifically for this space.
The artist explains each element: of the painting in the text below.
Image: Aerial view of Danny Eastwood’s painting, The Journey
“When I was first approached by Sr Maria, this had a lovely lawn area, a lovely piece of grass lawn. What a beautiful spot, a beautiful garden and all around, to do this artwork. So, when I looked at the ground, this beautiful buffalo lawn was all through here, so I had a vision to ask if it could be concreted because it reminded me of a boomerang shape and I’d be happy to paint on it. Prior to that I waited for a bit of time, and then they rang me up and said the concrete’s laid.
But me, and I work with my friend John Weeks, we came and had a look, but this paint we have on here it’s not just, it’s … a special paint … it’s like the paint you see on driveways when you go round the neighbourhoods where cars come in, it’s like it’s got a special mixture in, with cement rendering coloured dyes in it. And we had to … all this paint has been specially mixed up and made on the spot, so it’s not coming out of a can. It was specially rendered with a special material, so it can last for 50-60 years and keep these lovely, bright colours.
Now getting on to the artwork:
This first part starts when the Sisters first came out from Ireland, so that represents the Sisters first coming out from Ireland and I won’t mention the different groups of sisters, I’ll just go on and go through it.
So this is when they first settled in Parramatta with the women, the convict women out there, but they moved on from there and these footprints means where they travelled throughout the country and they branched out on the different paths. The hands up here mean the helping hands they passed on to the groups as they passed through and moved on to different things.
The books here means they started schools in Parramatta area and all the different areas in education, and they brought education with them…
…and these are the pathways they took, the lines, the roads, the black part means at the back, the roadway…they followed through the land.
As they moved through the land, they moved on, this means medication because they started helping the poor with Tuberculosis and all that, and they built hospitals as the sisters moved and the different groups came along, and that represents the medical, the hospitals and the charity work, helping the poor, and helping Tuberculosis, the convicts and supporting them with medication.
As we move along, you see the footprints coming along, they’re spreading out through the country besides. And this is the early when they had contact with the aboriginal people, they also are taking care of them, looking after their families. Meeting and helping them also, with education, medical, and also beside the convicts, the general population.
Now we move into the middle here, and plus not only they’re also teaching the Gospel and the Catechism as they go along also.
The most important part of this artwork is the memorial itself and the history behind it, and all the dedicated Sisters who came beforehand, and all their history.
These symbols here, they represent Aboriginal people, if you look down from an aeroplane, the head would be here, the shoulders would be there, and they would be the kneecaps.
Where you see a small stick, that represents women. A small symbol represents a child, and the one with the longer stick represents a male. So these are sitting around the monument here are the aboriginal people they help, and they’re paying respect to all these sisters who are from the past and in memorial.
These symbols here means East, West, South, and North, and the symbols mean groups of people and groups of areas where they branched out into.
Cause these footprints keep moving across the country from Parramatta and throughout where all the sisters travelled and the helping hands were following along. It’s not just a circle…it’s a special tribute to the sisters.
As we go on, we’re getting into Parramatta now, and the road leads all the way through. This is the local Darug people here, the local tribes, and the local that’s a male and his son with him there, and this represents the work they did in the Parramatta People, and the Darug people in this tribe.
Parramatta is represented by the Eels. Now, these two Eels here are very similar to the designs you see around the posts and the signs around Parramatta, unfortunately they’ve been there for 20 years, but they’re no longer going to be represented on the signage out here, because it’s all going to be replaced with Darug names and they’re too hard to keep the, because they’re over 20 years now and they’re too hard to keep the upkeep on, so they’re slowly going to disappear, and we’ll have all Darug name places in the area.
And as we move along, further along, if you see the Parramatta Logo, the Council logos, and because of the Paramatta river, which I should have mentioned, that yellow part in the middle, that’s the river, that’s Parramatta River, passing through Parramatta.
It’s not just a pretty painting, there is a story right all the way through this painting, it’s just not to make it look like a pretty painting, it does have meaning and has representation.
And these represent the Parramatta river, in the Canoe, what you see on the Council Logo, and representing Parramatta and the Darug people. So, this is all representing.
And, once again, to finish it off, we have the big mother Eel heading towards the river and flowing across the weirs and across here, plus the local fish.
Image: Danny Eastwood (L) and John Weeks (R)
Me, myself, my mother came from Ngemba, that’s far western NSW, called Brewarrina. It’s got the oldest monument in the world up there, it’s got the Aboriginal fish traps, they’re much, much, thousands and thousands of years older than the pyramids and any known history, the first thing, one of the first things.
I was born in Waterloo, Redfern, in that area and I was brought up in the city, mainly myself, and I have artwork all throughout Sydney. And I’ve got to mention, can you come up John?
Now because I was working in the schools and doing lots of work, I was very committed, I could only come here once a week, or more or less and this is John my helper and he helped me with mix up the paints and to do the special materials, because I had a crook knee at the time also, and he helped me do a lot the artwork, I’d mark it out and asked him to paint this and paint that, and he’d help me.
So, it’s not only me doing all this hard work on this, it’s his dedication, he helps me out on a lot of materials now. And I thank John for assisting me on this project. It took us a number of weeks as I was going to schools, and it was raining, it actually rained sometimes in that period during this artwork. It took me longer than I thought, and I hope you appreciate the work we’ve done and thank you very much for inviting me.
