Outback Magazine – Issue 148 – March 2023
English | 166 pages | pdf | 58.55 MB
Welcome at Outback Magazine Issue 148 March 2023
Growth is integral to life – physical, mental, environmental, agricultural, emotional, spiritual. OUTBACK delves into all of these. This issue’s Outback Story, for example, looks at Australia’s cotton industry (p40). We grow some of the highest quality, best yielding cotton in the world, and are at the forefront of scientific innovation to minimise chemical inputs and degradation. Nevertheless, the sector faces periodic criticism for matters ranging from water management to environmental impact.
For talented young photographer Georgia Bragg, whose work features in our photo essay (p84), growing up on Beemery in western NSW has been central to her development in a creative field. It was this upbringing that got her interested in “the importance of growth and the people who make it happen”. Coincidentally, her mother Skye was one of my sister’s bridesmaids almost 30 years ago. We’ve all grown in many ways since then.
Farmer of the Year Michael Taylor is devoted to growing the legacy of the 5 generations of Taylors who preceded him on their New England property (p90). Trees, wool, beef and family are all vital elements in the ongoing growth of their operation and the community of which he is a part.
Artist Honor Freeman takes her own particular approach to growth (p104). She works in slip-cast porcelain to recreate the most pedestrian and prosaic of objects – old slivers of laundry soap, a pillow, besser-bricks. Her sculptures render the castoff as things of beauty for us to cherish and keep, and through contemplation, to grow.
This development of our inner landscapes is every bit as important as the management and growth of the physical. Andrew Hull’s poem ‘Two Up’ (p149) emphasises this duality:
The day must always chase the night
And autumn never sees the spring
The world is always dark and light
With every season in full swing
This edition also marks 20 years of my working on OUTBACK. It feels like the blink of an eye, and also like many long years of growth and change. I thank my excellent colleagues and all of you who engage with us for your part in our growth.
Mark Muller
Editor-in-Chief
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