well here it is folks. the beginning of it all. the little adventure that set me off on this very special journey, which subsequently lead me to taking you all with me. and it started on this road. and with these sheep…
Where are we? In a dry dusty deadbeat country town called Bathurst, in New South Wales. Ha, I am only joking with you Aussies in the know out there! I am exaggerating of course, it’s my Hollywood voice (I didn’t know I had one but apparently in this post I do).
Bathurst is actually a flourishing, rich soiled country town, full of cool people, cool shops and awesome restaurants. But compared to the Sydney beaches where I come from, Bathurst is dry and isolated, so lets just go with that for the sake of my story. Anyhow, this is perhaps not where you expected the inspiration for My Heart Wanders to begin. But that’s how the good things happen: In the subtlest of ways, and in the most unsuspecting of places.
I was on a mission on this day back in ’03. My friend and artist idol, Greg Hyde, had agreed for me to come and shoot his incredible property. Getting up at the crack of dawn I drove the 3 & 1/2 hours to his country home, located in a part of Bathurst called Sunny Corner. Once I had turned onto the long winding driveway, passed his picture-perfect sheep and entered into the main courtyard, I felt something. Somehow, something had whispered to me that I was somewhere very very special.
Greg’s entire home has been made from things he found and salvaged from torn down homes and boutiques, and the rest he made with his bare hands; forming, drying, and stacking individual mudbricks. Greg and his lovely wife Trish completed the project about 20 years ago. There is also a large studio, small gallery, and pristine croquet lawn on the estate.
The main house features an old, country style kitchen with a long rustic table that seats more than ten people. This is the centre of the home, the welcoming area for guests who pop in for a cup of tea and a chat. A number of doors surrounding this area lead into other areas of the home: off to the right is a formal dining and music room, filled with artworks, books, a piano and dining table. All rooms lead to the outdoors with floor to ceiling antique French doors. These rooms are richly decorated with heavy fabrics and oil paintings in vibrant reds, oranges and black. Continuing down the hall is a gorgeous bathroom complete with a ‘vacancy and occupied’ doorknob, antique shower head and vanity mirror. Further down the hall is the greenhouse, complete with Vincent’s Yellow House which Greg decided was essential to create for this light filled space. Another one of his personal inspiration corners, no doubt.
Going left from the bathroom is the family quarters – 2 rooms featuring white painted mud bricks and wooden window frames. These rooms are cool and calming, with views out over the valley. Above these rooms is the main bedroom with a breakfast balcony that looks out over the clothes line and onto the property and surrounding paddocks.
Every corner of the property lures the eye with some creation. And upon walking back down the stairs from the main bedroom I spotted something I did not notice on my ascent – did I see correctly? A lace curtain had a distinct rip in the left corner. The rip was in the shape of a heart, and the afternoon sun was shining right through it. I took a photograph and stood there for some time, gazing at this piece. And all of a sudden I felt my heart wander – right through this heart shaped hole and out the window. I couldn’t help but smile deeply. Something had been awoken in me, and it would be a few years later before I found the meaning of this intimate moment.
Something else that caught my eye was a line of artworks with the last one an unmistakable portrait of one of Australia’s most-loved figures – Mr. Squiggle. Fashioned by Abigail Hyde, Greg’s eldest daughter, this gorgeous artwork was featured in a Sydney Gallery and at the opening Mr. Squiggle himself attended the event. He was so taken by the portrait that he immediately offered to purchase the work. Greg advised his daughter not to sell, and so the work sits in this humble home and seems like it could not fit more perfectly anywhere else.
The barn is home to the studio, artist’s library, framing workshop and gallery. Ink bottles form an artwork in themselves, with a backdrop of the croquet lawn. Oh how I felt like a game, but time was of the essence! I only had the day to shoot and interview Greg, and it was already late and I had to drive home.
Greg let me do whatever I wanted that day, I was free to play in his house and home, to wander through his private studio and gaze up at his scribblings and unfinished works, to sip tea with him and talk deeply of what we’d each learnt in this life. I felt silly telling him my wisdoms, I was just 25, but still he listened intently to what I had to say, and took it all in as if he was listening to the Dalai Lama. At 6pm I had to pull myself away from this magical place, but not before I had a chance to create a little still life set of my own with Greg’s retro table and chairs that I found in the old workshed…
Before I drove away I saw this, dangling from a tree branch. Was it my heart, caught on a eucalyptus branch, swaying and glistening in the afternoon light?
I left that place with so much inspiration. The artist in me that had been suppressed for so long had finally found it’s escape – right through that torn lace curtain and into the big wide world. I realised a piece of my little wandering heart had indeed remained on this magnificent property, and remains there still. But in the years to come I would realise that my heart had always been a roamer, and had left a little trail all over the world, from the time I was born on that big island down under, to all the places I have lived and loved in this world.
And it’s a wonderful thing, this wandering heart.
Because it led me straight to you.
_______________________________________________
Credits:
All images and words by Pia Jane Bijkerk.
Home courtesy of Greg Hyde. To view and purchase his incredible work,click here. If you are in Bathurst you can check out his home gallery, just give him a call. Or visit this gallery in Bowral which will be holding an exhibition of his work from this Friday June 6, for a month.
Extra notes: All images were shot on my trusty Canon AE-1 – oh i do miss film. And are you wondering why I didn’t take photos of the interior? Well I did! But all the shots are on film and some were not transferred into digital files so all the negatives sit patiently for me in a box in Sydney. One day I will be able to show you the rest of Greg’s beautiful home. So there will be a Part 2 to this story sometime in the near future.
extra extra note: this post needs a soundtrack i have decided, and this is it. enjoy.
wow, pia! i read this post with my jaw dropped. love the photos! love the property! and love your story! thank you, thank you for sharing!
June 5th, 2008 | #
So beautiful I need to sit for a moment and take it all in. Your photos are beautiful. I love the way a journey brings out the best in us.
June 5th, 2008 | #
thank you to greg and bathurst for a magical environment, which is evident in your lovely photos. and to you pia, for such a wonderful project. i loved reading the story behind “my heart wanders” and learning how trans-formative the experience of that shoot was for you as an artist.
relatively speaking, i’m just a photography novice; a simple girl with a simple camera. but, this project has really helped me see things in a new way and i don’t just mean hearts. i’ve really loved trying to create something that is in line with the project and to think more about all of the elements involved in taking a photo. the process has been trans-formative for me and i’m going to keep working at it.
thanks so much!
June 5th, 2008 | #
Speechless.
June 5th, 2008 | #
oh Pia! I loved this. I felt my heart wander when I read this. how fantastic.
and I’m really really trying to work one more photo in to send you for the project. I hope to get it to you this weekend! 🙂
June 5th, 2008 | #
Beautiful post Pia, you took me down under through places I’ve never been (and don’t know if I’ll ever go). The house description is just perfect and in fact for some seconds I thought I was there with you…
Beautiful photos, beautiful words.
June 5th, 2008 | #
wow pia… what a story. and you may know that this piece certainly resontates with me. bathurst holds a special place in my heart… in 2 months we will be marrying there 🙂
June 5th, 2008 | #
knowing the magical little seed from which ‘my heart wanders’ sprouted makes me appreciate the project all the more. a little tear in the fabric of the universe and look where it led 🙂
beautiful photos, as always. (and i love greg’s himalaya snow leopard and african lion etchings.)
June 5th, 2008 | #
I saw that first pic and thought, I know that. That’s Mudgee. I was close. Sunny Corner’s not that far away. I love the light and landscape of that area – have you ever been to Glen Alice and Newnes and those big cliffs (the biggest land canyon outside the Grand Canyon apparently and no one knows it’s there). I might transfer some of my film to digital just to show people. I always drove around Mudgee and Rylstone and Pyramul and Gulgong with my camera (a 40-year-old Pentax Spotmatic) and like you miss film. Thanks for sharing. Oh, and the Bowral link … was there on the weekend. More country goodness. Love, love Peppergreen Trading Co. at Berrima. I just blogged on it.
June 5th, 2008 | #
absolutely breathtaking photos… wow…
June 5th, 2008 | #
oh, pia, this is amazing. you are such an inspiration, as always.
June 5th, 2008 | #
Beautiful post Pia, thank you.
June 5th, 2008 | #
thank you, i can’t tell you how much i love hearing that this post touched you like it did me. it wrote itself, i was just the mediator i think.
and i love hearing from my aussie readers and your experience of the area, thanks katie! and deborah, i was hoping you would read this post, knowing your background and love for the area too.
nyla – i love those paintings too – but you should see them in real life – the tiny pictures on the internet do nothing for Greg’s work. But when you stand in front of one of his lions, it is breathtaking.
you have all made my morning!
xx
June 5th, 2008 | #
I used to live at Dark Corner. Right next door to Sunny Corner.
I loved, loved, loved that place and after looking through your beautiful pictures and story, then, to hear the soundtrack, I am moved to tears at how much the area remains in my heart and I miss it.
Thank you, thank you.
ps. I knew from the first picture (or thought I did) where you were. How bizarre, when in some ways it seems so generic.
June 5th, 2008 | #
magnificient post.
my heart’s wandered through it with you…
June 5th, 2008 | #
this is such a beautiful and inspiring post! so glad to know where this project all began. good start to my day here 🙂
June 5th, 2008 | #
i love hearing your own wandering heart story pia! it is such a perfect, humble beginning.
your friend, bird tweet robin from down the road
June 5th, 2008 | #
Oh.My.Goodness… This is such a great post! It’s wonderful to know the story, thanks so much for sharing it 🙂 It made my day.
June 6th, 2008 | #
this is incredible. thank you.
June 6th, 2008 | #
I didn’t expect a pristine croquet lawn! Beautiful photos.
June 6th, 2008 | #
Pia, I have just read the story you have written It is lovely, it is as if I was in a hot air balloon looking at you thru my binocolors watching you discover things and hearing your heart beat louder. Pia the funny thing is that i think we have all at times or at least I have(although i do believe many others) have felt inspired, awakened by your talents moved while staring at the screen but feeling instantly our hearts wander into your world that you document so beautifully…
again Pia I would like to thank you- because you so eloquently put a title to this chapter in my life!
June 6th, 2008 | #
ah…my kinda place!
June 6th, 2008 | #
your images Pia Jane…are, just…stunning.
June 7th, 2008 | #
wow Bec, that is so cool that you lived in Dark Corner! I always wondered if it was really dark 😉 Thank you for such a beautiful comment.
darling Nadia, you leave such heartfelt comments, I am really happy to know that you find inspiration here. It is exactly what I was hoping to achieve with my life and my work. Thank you.
Well, it’s the weekend now, and all your incredible comments on this post have given me the lift up I needed to keep going with my work. Thank you girls!!! I wonder if I have any boy readers ever.
June 7th, 2008 | #
his home is amazing….i love the 2 pictured of the windows…one with drape…one with bottles…so lovely…
June 9th, 2008 | #