Hold on, It's Impossible

After two years of living in one of Britain's rainiest cities, I moved to Mildura, a semi-arid agricultural community which was experiencing its tenth year of drought. The cloud (and the rain that comes with it), which had been a much loathed part of daily life in the UK, became something everyone was longing for, a sign of hope.
Hold On, It's Impossible,
Bobbin lace, cotton and silver thread,
linen and metallic thread (bobbin lace) (Mildura), paper-cut, ink
2010


First exhibited in an urban subway at the end of 2010, Hold On, It's Impossible depicts a heroine determined to bring a cloud to the 'food bowl' by pulling on streams of rain. Over the two month period of the exhibition, Mildura received more than ten times the rainfall that it did at the same time the previous year. Drought became flood, the cloud no longer a sign of hope, and the 'heroine' now appears to be a solitary figure struggling to drag her baggage.

Hold On, It's Impossible, 2010
(detail)