Tides of time

Tides take a long time to change. In this short film, sit and reflect as you watch the tide transform through a time-lapse on the beach. Fragments of an archive, recreated with ink, bleed, dilute and fade powerless against nature, far away from the safety of the State Library’s archive rooms. No one could have guessed that The Letters smuggled out of Holsworthy Internment Camp in 1919 were to endure as long as they have. They were mere notes sent to inform townspeople of the happenings inside the camp. Who could have known paper and ink would prove resilient? But when I try to transform the fragile archival fragment into permanence: staining permanent marker on Australia’s fixed national border, impermanence is the result? My message is washed away. A call for transparency becomes translucent in the current and I am left asking, “who, or what decides what survives the tides of history?”