The primary object here is the hollowed out elbow of a National Trust-registered 'Spotted Gum' (eucalyptus maculata) reputedly planted in 1852 at Melbourne University from Queensland seed collected and donated by Ferdinand von Mueller. The tree fell following natural degeneration and wood-grub infestation in December 2000, a past clearly evidenced in the woodworm striations, burrowing-holes and channels of the finished piece. The original log has been hollowed-out to a fraction of its original mass, partly re-sculpted, cleaned, sanded down and sealed. The leaves of the European Linden (T. europaea) picked green from a suburban Melbourne planting have been daubed with acrylic paint and pressed against the raw wood surface leaving their imprint.

Texts include the ancient and perhaps most fundamental of all Jewish prayers, the Hebrew Sh'ma; the German phrase refers to the Inn of the two Lindens from the Michaelis family history and As birds hovering, which also forms the title of the work, comes from the great prophet Isaiah.

This work draws upon my earlier photographic practice by employing plant material and water craft associations. The paint I have used has been made from burnt photographic paper mixed with an acrylic base. There are Land Art antecedents in the symbolic manipulation of site-referenced organic materials but closer affinities are with the dark, historically grounded expressionist fabrications of Boltanski, Bourgeois or the Poiriers.