Julie Fearns-Pheasant

We are all narratives, regardless of our labels.

I came to Armadale as an immigrant with family and lived here as a child, returning 24 years ago on my own. As a teacher and artist for over 40 years, art, education, and the creative process are essential to my identity and existence as a person. Similarly, I choose to work with images related to human existence.

My story is a deeply personal one; it spans many years of challenge, diversity, and labels. It is also interwoven with community, creativity, and stubborn will. I am literally covered in labels, but who isn’t by my age?

Some of the labels relate to the ‘physical persona’; a woman, a person with a disability, and a breast cancer survivor in 2007. The others relate to my passions; creativity, motherhood, community, and teaching. All these tags are positives, regardless of circumstance or scars one might have because of them.

I have assisted the City of Armadale to develop some of its visual arts initiatives, including the Minnawarra Art Awards and Outside the Frame, and have been a participant in the Armadale Hills Open Studio Arts Trail for over four years. Together with other degrees, I have a Masters in Cross-Disciplinary Arts & Design, over ten solo exhibitions and numerous joint shows under my belt, am well-versed in illustration, painting, and many mixed media projects.

However, there is one achievement I keep quiet about. I was the first Australian to win dual gold medals at the International Abilympics, both in 1991, 1996. Abilympics (Olympics of Abilities) are vocational skills competitions designed for persons with disabilities to enable them to expose their unique talents.

I kept it quiet about the four gold medals as I was bothered about the labelling (and subtle segregation) it gave me and my work. I put my medals away in a drawer somewhere gathering dust. Embarrassed.

In a country that loves physical achievement and sports stars, in the 70s through to the 90s, my achievement was discounted by mainstream media. One bright spark asked; 'Does she look newsworthy?’ I can only presume what that meant… An article was written in the local paper with a fitting title ‘Secret Champ Comes Home’. By a friend.

The constant need to prove my worth and intelligence can be pretty exhausting. I had a previous experience where the two life designations when put together had either been detrimental or considered tokenism. I decided to acknowledge my creative being and almost deny the somatic self. Easier.

I have been a teacher of young people for over twenty-five years. I now work with a particularly young group of Armadale artists called the Leos, who have been with me for over 4 years. Each student is talented in their own right. Finding their abilities and talent has given them their reason and path in life. I feel an absolute pleasure to at least guide them through the beginning stages of their purpose.

Another group I belong to is kind of like a ‘community tribe’. The Waterwheel Galleries where my work is exhibited has a creative group called the UFOs (Unfinished Objects) that now meet to support, nourish, and share. We set the world right once a week, recognising our developing ideas as catalysts for new beginnings and statements about how creativity keeps people together in times of disquiet or unease. Laughter ripples through the stone walls as needles, thread, and (when I’m there) paint becomes beautiful pieces of visual voices. They are family.

This year, I was chosen as the Armadale Arts Festival Artist. To be acknowledged by my peers, my community, and by the City, I have lived in for so many years, both as a child and now as an adult, means so much to me. I want to show others with ‘life labels’, be they disabilities, mental health concerns, or difficult circumstances, that labels are not necessarily negative but life essences. We can use our essences for creative pathways of identity expression. Art does that. I know deep in my centre that the arts can inspire and encourage and give people a reason to keep going and feel 'okay'. The arts are a way for us to express and visualise our world in ways that nothing else can do.

It's interesting considering yourself to be a Human Story as we are all narratives, regardless of our labels.