Introducing
Sandie and Angus Wilson
Farmers & artists. Proudly raising the profile of public art in the Goondiwindi Community.
Sandie & Angus Wilson play a big part in our own Goondiwindi Cotton Art & Sculpture Trail, with a lot of Angus' sculptures showcased throughout the tour. Angus' work is amongst some of the most loved creative works in our town and today we take a glimpse into the couples world as we learn where they find their inspiration.
Sandie & Angus, tell us a little about yourselves.
Sandie ~ I am a farmer’s daughter and grew up on farms in central New South Wales and central Queensland. I have always been interested in art and creating and studied art and home economics at boarding school. I went on to become a nurse after school, met and married Angus not long after, and were blessed with four wonderful and very active children. We live on a family property called '’Nungwai” 5km from Goondiwindi and work a broad acre farming operation 60 km south of the Queensland border. My mother in law, who also lived on the property, renovated an old woolshed towards the back of the garden into an art studio. It was primarily used for conducting clay sculpture workshops and this is where I became more actively involved with art and the community.
Angus ~ My mother was very talented in art and my early indication of interest was studying a Bachelor of Design Studies at UQ. Upon completion, I returned to farming in the Goondiwindi region, which between that and a young family took up all my time. After some time I reignited my interest in art by doing metal and clay sculptures around the Nungwai garden. In time, these sculptures grew in size and I thought I would make them more accessible to the public.
As both of you are artists, where do you draw your inspiration from for your own pieces?
Angus ~ With farming you sometimes get very little time to work on your art so when I do return to my art I’m reinvigorated & ready to go. I like to find challenging pieces to work on & different mediums to use. So whether it is a piece of scrap metal in the rubbish dump or an idea I’ve seen on our travels there are lots of different avenues to get inspiration.
Sandie ~ I do not call myself an artist as such but more prefer to be regarded as one of its many big supporters in our community and assist where I can with events such as Nungwai Sculpture School, Lanescape and others. I am one of Angus’s biggest fans and thoroughly enjoy being a part of his large scale projects and a sounding board for his ideas. I love channelling my creativity with helping others to make their events more beautiful and attractive with plants and foliage from my garden. We are very honoured to open our garden on occasions for events and photography.
We all had another amazing night at this year's Lanescape Festival! Can you tell us a little more about the event and the group that makes it all happen?
Lanescape was formed by a few of us with the interest of getting public art into the town of Goondiwindi. We have since expanded our committee with like minded people & certainly not all artists, but with other many talents. Lanescape started with small intentions however the local support & backing we had from the community was extremely encouraging. We have a festival each year to showcase & celebrate our art. After the festival is over there are a lot of calls for more regular events but it is very time consuming for a fully volunteer committee.
What exciting things can we look forward to from Lanescape in the future?
Lanescape was initially a 5 year program however this will have to be reviewed given the current local enthusiasm shown. Working with the community, we will continue to raise the profile of public art in Goondiwindi with an area from the CBD to the boat ramp precinct being our next focus.
