Riverside Artists Create Their Own Cover Stories

ACH Group’s Riverside Artists created their own magazine covers as part of this year’s South Australian Living Artists (SALA) Festival.

The covers, on display this month at ACH Group’s head office at Mile End, reflect the personal stories of each artist, expressed in a range of mixed media including photos, sketches, paintings and headlines.

“All these works are personal insights based on the theme ‘A Moment in Time,” ACH Group art teacher Gaynor Jarvis says. “Some of them are light-hearted, some are political; they’re all unique and feature something meaningful to the artist.”

Group member Joy Forrest, who joined the Port Noarlunga group three years ago, used her cover to highlight the plight of endangered species.

Her ink and pen sketch depicts a Tasmanian devil, bilby and platypus alongside extinct dinosaurs with the words: “Joining Extinction?”.

A volunteer with the Friends of the Aldinga Scrub, Joy says she is passionate about raising awareness of the threat posed by land clearing in Australia.

“It’s we, as people, who are pushing animals to the brink of extinction,” she says. “We should be looking after what we have.”

Volunteer Judith Lamb, who joined Riverside Artists in 2007 after emigrating from the UK, created a light-hearted cover to reflect her new-found love of cruise trips.

“I painted the sunset in the background and used images of a cruise ship, hammock and my photo,” she says. “I enjoy going to new places and a lot of people who know me think of me as a traveller.”

ACH Group Program Assistant Anne Greenwood based her cover on her love of agility training her three dalmations, with headlines “101 reasons to get a dog” and “Every dog has its day”. She enjoys ‘dabbling’ in art while she helps run the group. “Riverside Artists is a great group – everybody that comes here gets along, they all help each other. It’s like a little family.”

Riverside Artists is one of many art groups across South Australia run by ACH Group to provide an opportunity for older people to create artwork and connect with others.

This year is ACH Group’s biggest SALA exhibition to date, with six venues across Adelaide, representing more than 80 individual artists and over 150 pieces of art work.

Find out more about ACH Group.