The metal Rajah Quilt is an Interpretation of the Quilt made by Women on the Convict Ship Rajah
It was made by members of Senior Momentum and was unveiled on 7 November 2004 at a muster of convict descendants held at the Female Factory Historic Site, the site of the convict women's prison in South Hobart as part of Tasmania's bicentenary celebrations.
Supported by the Australian Government Regional Arts Fund, Women Tasmania and the Tasmanian Department of Tourism, Parks and Heritage. Funding from the Australian Government Regional Arts Fund and Women Tasmania. Supported by Recovery Inc.
The metal quilt is 2m by 2m, securely attached to a metal stand designed to be bolted into a concrete base when a permanent structure. Made from recycled metal, copper, brass, iron. Engraved central brass panel. |
Descendants of two of the convict women whose names are engraved on the central panel of the "quilt"
This quilt honours the original Rajah Quilt and its makers.
As an outdoor sculpture it has to be able to "weather the weather", to withstand the storms that parallel the storms that had overtaken the lives of the convict women.
It is not intended to be beautiful in the conventional sense; life for the Rajah women was not beautiful. Patchwork pieces cut from abandoned and discarded items have been cobbled together to make a new and unrelated object, recycled metal signifying the strength and resilience of the women, cut from their old lives and thrown together to make a new community.
Spaces represent the loss of family friends and homeland, represent the void through which the women travelled. Migrating birds of passage and blue birds of happiness hold aloft the inscribed plate in honour of the women and children of the Rajah.
Made by members of Senior Momentum: Frances Watson, Jennifer Line, Jan Barker and Sam Murdoch
The story of the Metal Rajah Quilt appeared in the
September 2005 issue of The Genealogist, the magazine of the Australian Institute of Genealogical Studies Inc.
images (below and right) Sam Murdoch and the assembly team who helped construct the Metal Rajah Quilt at Mt Nelson
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