Natalie Davey
Born:
Bunuba
Lives in:
Walmajarri, Australia
Location
- White Bay Power Station
Natalie Davey is a multidisciplinary artist. Her art practice includes acrylic painting, soundscapes, photography, audio visual works, jewellery, animation, design for clothing, logos and illustrations for children’s books. Through her art Davey shares her world. She creates practical and interactive experiences for people to gain understanding of the cultures and environments she inhabits. Central to her work and belief is that people, place, flora, and fauna are always connected. She believes acknowledging and working with these interconnections is central to knowing who we are and caring for everything and everyone around us. For Davey, art is a vital life practice that helps her remember better, work through ideas and issues, and creates understanding and beauty in the world.
Natalie Davey
Born 1979, Bunuba Country (Fitzroy Crossing), Australia
Lives and works Bunuba Country (Fitzroy Crossing),
Australia Walmajarri and Bunuba
A Nightscape 2025
multimedia, looped 31 mins
Commissioned by the Biennale of Sydney with assistance from Tura
Courtesy of the artist
The arrival of Ex-Tropical Cyclone Ellie in January 2023 brought heavy rainfall that saw the Western Australian Kimberley town of Fitzroy Crossing flood to the level of 15.81 metres. Drowning thousands of cattle, countless wildlife and buckling the Fitzroy Bridge, A Nightscape captures the deluge as artist Natalie Davey experienced it. The shift from day to night, wet season as usual to the unknown. Woken by unusual silence in the early hours of January 3rd, Davey began recording as the floodwaters rose around, and beneath, her Darlngunaya home.
An immersive world of sound and darkness, A Nightscape captures Davey’s seemingly contradictory feelings of panic and stillness as the night stretched on. Incorporating real-time recordings, Davey guides audiences through that evening with the same sparse illumination of headtorch, or phone light, she herself had access too. Through flashes of rushing water, tree lines and wildlife, A Nightscape spotlights the cycles of distress, reprieve, horror, and even occasional humour, unique to disaster experiences. Suggesting the floodwaters’ rush into her home was as foreign to Davey as her home was to the flood itself, A Nightscape distils the mutual upheaval of artist and Country.
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