Coochiemudlo Island

A handmade present will always be special, but this year, you could leave the creative work to the island's artists and makers. The Coochie Handmade Mother’s Day are on Saturday, May 13th - just in time for mum’s special day. These are our fourth local handmade pop-up markets on Coochiemudlo, held at the Red Rock Café. Sisters Trish and Elissa Miller from Bay Island Beads, will again show and sell their stunning pieces. We have met with Trish to learn more about the art of be

Many times I’ve been asked why I paint, but that’s like asking a writer why he writes or a hairdresser why she styles people’s hair. I don’t really know where that desire to begin practising art came from. No-one in my family painted seriously. There were a few dabblers here and there, and of course they mainly hid their ‘talent’ because they just wanted their work to be a hobby, who knows? Occasionally I’ll read about someone who has always painted and as a child never left

The natural environment of Coochiemudlo Island provides great inspiration for many of the island’s artisans, but just as many others will tell you it’s the peace and seclusion of island life that really gets the creative juices flowing. Ceramicists Denise Wright and Viv Wright are uniquely positioned to explain this phenomenon, having lived on Coochie for decades while growing their renowned arts practices here. This resident couple also pioneered the art of ensuring visitors

So common are parrots to this island continent that they factored in one of the earliest European names for Australia. Three centuries before Matthew Flinders, Portuguese explorers mooted ‘Psitacorum Regio’ (‘The Land of Parrots’) as a suitable name for the southern land they’d seen was replete with parrot life, and that name appears on the 1564 New World Map by Antwerp cartographer Abraham Ortelius. Paintings by Michael Burge are for sale at bluethumb.com.au Everyone has the

Artists and artisans have long been drawn to the quiet life on Coochiemudlo Island, but it’s not all lazy days at the easel or the potting wheel! Behind the fringe of green that surrounds this patch of Moreton Bay there’s always been a hive of creative industry, and now you have a chance to benefit from all the hard work. This year, a cluster of artists is working towards a very special event on Saturday, December 17, 11am-3pm at Red Rock Café, right at the island’s Main Beac