15,000 squares, 500 hours, 19 months: how I used embroidery to make sense of Australia’s catastrophic fires

I slip the needle through a small loop of black thread, pull it tight and snip. Done. I have just tied off the very last stitch on an embroidered scroll that has taken me more than 500 hours across 19 months to complete.

All of my artwork is extremely labour-intensive. But I have to admit, this is a bit excessive, even for me. It’s not surprising that I have been asked more than once “why not just outsource the labour?” and even “what is the point?”

I always sigh and think enviously of plumbers. I am 100% sure hardworking tradies are never asked to justify the point of their work.

Why do I work so hard? There is no one easy answer, it’s different every time. The labour intensity of my processes adds time into the equation and this both carries meaning and can change the meaning of the work as it goes on (and on and on). I always learn something unexpected.

I put my little scissors down and, before busting out the bubbles, I snap a picture for Instagram because #selfpromotion, but also because this is news, albeit of a very slow-breaking kind. This is what I’ve learned after stitching for seemingly endless hours: while no news may be good news, “slow news” is even better.

My embroidered scroll is titled Impossible Numbers. It started as my attempt to memorialise the estimated 3,000,000,000 non-human lives lost in the devastating bushfires of 2019–20, a number impossible to actually comprehend.