Bonnie Porter Greene‘s interactive art project, Palimpsest, transforms the concept of layered, weathered surfaces into a powerful exploration of collective trauma, climate change psychology, and community healing through the metaphor of weathered bill posters.

Palimpsest was created in 2020, after Porter Greene’s community in the Shoalhaven had suffered through months of the devastating Black Summer bushfires. When the pandemic hit immediately afterward, there was no space or time between traumatic events for communities to come together and process what had happened.

The inspiration struck during the pandemic’s early days, as the artist envisioned cities worldwide shutting down while advertisements for cancelled cultural events remained plastered on walls. “I imagined cities around the world closing down, but all the posters of events that would never happen, remaining on the streets, tunnels and walls, fading, warping and peeling. A memory of the lost energy of cultural activities that never happened.“

Porter Greene has always been intrigued by how bill posters, peeled by wind, rain and human hands, create ‘accidental’ artworks. No two are the same. These weathered surfaces became a potent symbol for how communities process grief in our age of climate disasters.

Initially named reHeal, the project was born to create space as a catalyst for conversations and healing in communities impacted by climate-induced disasters. It has been presented five times in Shoalhaven, (NSW) communities, featuring powerful community-submitted images of fear—their experiences of the Black Summer fires. These photographs captured smoke-filled skies, evacuating cars, and people fleeing their homes. Contrasting these were Porter Greene’s images of hope—the bush regrowing in full bloom and tender new shoots emerging from blackened earth.

The project creates space for climate disaster-affected communities to gather, gently conversing or simply being present together while peeling the layers of fear, to reveal hope. Nine large boards, each the size of traditional bill posters, are installed side by side along a fence or wall, recreating the feeling of walking through city streets lined with layered advertisements.

Each board is prepared with hand-colored black and white A1 images. The choice to print in black and white, then hand-color each piece, emerged from both practical constraints and artistic intention—echoing the traditional practice of hand-coloring photographs before color film.

The installation process mirrors both natural weathering and human intervention. Each board receives multiple paper layers applied with handmade wheat paste—the same adhesive used by bill posters. Deliberate air pockets are left between layers to facilitate the peeling process, inviting community participation in the artwork’s evolution.

Participants become active collaborators, encouraged to pick and peel at the layers. The invitation to “destroy” an artwork generates profound responses—giggles, smiles, and tentative questions of “Am I allowed to?” transform into moments of joyful liberation. When audiences ask: “What level of madness do you have to have to ask people to come and destroy your work?“, Porter Greene responds with “Climate change anxiety?”

The act of peeling becomes a physical manifestation of processing difficult emotions, allowing communities to engage with loss and renewal through their hands.

It is Porter Greene’s aim to share Palimpsest as a catalyst for conversations and healing in communities impacted by climate-induced disasters—to serve as an emergency kit for fostering connection and hope when communities need it most.

In 2023, Porter Greene created a color-only version for Open Field as an act of joy, delight and surprise. The artist’s curiosity with layers and time extends to another ongoing installation (Accumulated Landscapes) currently showing at Shoalhaven Regional Gallery, where she adds layers of oil paint to thirty works on paper, building up over time until the paper buckles under the weight of the paint.

Accumulated Landscapes: Shoalhaven opens at Shoalhaven Regional Gallery Saturday 26th July, 2-4pm and runs until October 18th 2025. 

Find out more: https://www.shoalhavenregionalgallery.com.au/Whats-on/Exhibitions/Bonnie-Porter-Greene

Workshop: Abstract landscape painting with Bonnie Porter Greene, at Shoalhaven Regional Gallery Saturday, 13 September at 10:00 AM–01:00 PM.

Book here: https://www.shoalhavenregionalgallery.com.au/Whats-on/Events-and-programs/Abstract-landscape-painting-with-Bonnie-Porter-Greene-1498162928649

 

          

          

Image credits: Palimpsest, Arts In The Valley, Kangaroo Valley 2022. Bonnie Porter Greene. 

 

Posted by Elyssa Sykes-Smith

  • Painter, explorer. Bonnie Porter Greene, explores her love of the natural world through en plein air excursions & reflective studio practice & resulting in direct and honest painted memories.
  • Elyssa Sykes-Smith is a multidisciplinary artist, educator and climate psychology researcher, and Media Officer at AHNNA