BIYALA
(Pyro Burning on
Redwood slab)

WODONGA CITY COUNCIL | JULY 2025

For thousands of years the tall Biyala (Red Gum) and Dharnya (Box) trees sheltered the First Nations people. They sat in their shade in summer and gathered to rest and live.

These mighty trees supplied implements and food. Coolamon, canoes, and shields. The sap and leaves from the trees were used for medicinal purposes, the bark and its branches for shelter, their bark was taken without killing the trees, leaving a scar that healed.

Until settlement when these old trees and forests were felled to make way for a different way of life. To make furniture to sit on, for houses to live in to build fences that kept the First Nations people from their sacred ground. First Nations people lived in harmony with the trees.

This project was in collaboration with sculpture Xavier Pinard.

(Gum leaf’s in Metal)