Yasmin Smith: Salt, Sandstone & Coal | Elemental Life

Why It Matters

The installation fuses Sydney’s material heritage with pressing ecological issues, encouraging public engagement and influencing future art‑driven sustainability discourse.

Key Takeaways

• Early Sydney settlement relied on communal salt harvesting practices.
• Biennale invited participants to craft salt vessels, integrating kiln glaze.
• Clay incorporates Hawkesbury sandstone, linking art to Sydney’s geology.
• Coal‑ash paint references Eraring Power Station’s ecological footprint.
• Work bridges colonial history, industry, and contemporary environmental dialogue.

Summary

Yasmin Smith’s latest installation, “Salt, sandstone & coal,” debuted during the 2018 Biennale of Sydney on Cockatoo Island, using locally sourced raw materials to narrate the region’s colonial and industrial past.

The work references early settlers’ communal salt‑harvesting along the harbour, inviting Biennale visitors to shape small salt vessels whose glaze is activated by high‑temperature salt vapor. Smith blends Hawkesbury sandstone into the clay, a geological hallmark of the Sydney basin, while the painted walls are derived from coal ash collected at Eraring Power Station on Lake Macquarie.

Smith notes that the sandstone “connects to the Central Coast, the Blue Mountains, Southern Highlands and the Illawarra,” underscoring its architectural legacy, and that the coal‑ash glaze “draws those material connections” to highlight the ecological damage caused by ash dams and ongoing remediation efforts.

By turning historical trade, geological identity, and contemporary environmental concerns into tactile art, the piece prompts audiences to reconsider resource extraction’s legacy and demonstrates how collaborative, site‑specific practice can foster public dialogue on sustainability.

Original Description

At the 2018 Biennale of Sydney on Cockatoo Island, Yasmin Smith invited audiences to make salt vessels inspired by early colonial salt harvesting along Sydney Harbour.

_Drowned River Valley_ weaves together Hawkesbury sandstone and coal ash from Lake Macquarie - materials that built Sydney.

#history #sydney #industry