These shoes are favourites of people due to reasons such as a momentous occasion, comfort or love of design. They’ve walked many steps, entered many spaces, met many people, and have experienced many stories.  

Each pattern is unique to each person – representing their character of boldness, fun, graciousness and hardworking; and what they enjoy in life: love of the ocean, manga, the creative arts and photographing the details. They revolve around Australian natives – the Lilly Pilly, the Wax Flower, the Cranbrook Bell, the Kangaroo Paw and the Nafray.  Why? Because all these, the personalities, the interests and natives are all tolerant and strong and oh did I mention they are Australian too.

The thread and the stitching represent the stories which each person has lived and the impact and mark it has made (positive or negative). The colours are chosen because that’s the person’s favourite. Two colours though? Well, why not? I could’ve just chosen one, but two colours highlight the two cultures Asian Australians live in and have to maneuver through. The shapes and the stitching don’t match up – they dance with each other but aren’t boxed in. 

Why? Because they are not one or the other, they are not “them,” they are Australian too.  

And the threads left unstitched are just their stories to be continued. The tracing paper represents their skin. The skin in which some people have chosen to interact with and nothing more, nothing deeper.  And that’s where these racist interactions, big or small, before or during Covid occur.  It also represents the racist interactions that will occur post Covid… unless people recognize we are more than just our skin, we are Australian too.

Medium: Lino, Relief Ink, Cotton Calico, Tracing paper, Thread

Jocelin Meredith, a Melbourne based artist, has explored a variety of mediums including photography and digital media, majoring in printmaking through her BVA in 2007. 

Meredith explores themes of humanity, specifically the imprints left behind by challenges, influences, and tensions, on a person’s spirit. She is inspired by nature and ordinary objects and uses these to symbolise the value in the invaluable, the multitude/complex/ layered meanings, emotions and perspectives. Meredith hopes the different elements in her art connect vulnerably and inspire interaction and conversation amongst people, with an opportunity for storytelling, healing and a deepening understanding of each other.