Burnie Print Prize: Anthea Boesenberg

Rust, Blood, Gold and Cyanide

Woodcut, rust prints on kozo.

In 2019 I completed a short residency at Karangahake on the North Island of New Zealand. The ruins of the goldmine, especially the Victoria Battery (which processed the ore to enable extraction of gold) were like a grim monument to the labour of the many men and women who lived, worked and died there: the huge steel hoppers which once held the ore were now merely rusted remnants, and the grey concrete arches which once supported the cones now empty colonnades, and sudden shafts of bright light pierce the shattered roof of the building. The river below the Battery no longer runs blue with cyanide. 

The local graveyards tell the stories of men killed in mine accidents.