Unbroken Connections catalogue, Canberra Glassworks

Unbroken Connections 

MEGAN COPE 

20 May to 18 July 2021

Unbroken Connections is the exhibition 

resulting from Cope's residency at 

Canberra Glassworks in 2020 and 2021. 

This exhibition shares Megan Cope’s stories her families have with 

Minjerribah (North Stradbroke Island) within wider Quandamooka 

Country (Moreton Bay), for thousands of years and the unbroken 

connections between family and country in an ever-changing world. 

Cope gives new life to important historical narratives by casting 

bones of her peoples old ancestor Yungun (Dugong) in recycled 

television glass (CRT glass) noting the consequences of mass 

industrial extractive processes and the ongoing social, cultural and 

environmental impacts. 

Each piece tells a story of both Saltwater Country and Freshwater 

Country and marks the trees as sentient beings that grow there, 

holding time and earth within their roots and branches and amid 

your reflection. 

The exhibition invites an all encompassing visual interaction and 

proposes ways of thinking and remembering the natural world 

around us and our relationship with it. 

Megan is represented by Milani Gallery, Brisbane 

Cope also remembers the catastrophic fires along the east coast 

in recent years by carving through black glass revealing layers and 

markings of timber growth rings in 12 blown glass forms akin to 

those on ancestral shields and coolamons. Unbroken Connections 

also speaks to the responsibility and care that Aboriginal people feel 

for Country and our increased need for rights to protect it. 

3 | Unbroken Connections| 20 MAY TO 18 JULY 2021

Megan COPE 

Resist, Revive, Rehumanise 

2020/2021 

blown hand carved glass 

series of 12




Megan COPE 

Water is Life I, II, III, IIII, & IIIII 

2020/2021 

framed ink etched and engraved mirror 

series of 5 

Water is Life series 

Our people have many names for water, we understand its complexity and its sovereignty. 

Across the ocean in the east from here, in Aotearoa the government was the first in the world to grant legal 

personhood to the Whanganui River. The River Ganges and its longest tributary, the Yamuna in India’s 

northern Uttarakhand along with the Rio Atrato in Colombia are also granted human rights. 

Water is fast becoming at risk of becoming a commodity over which property rights are increasingly 

exercised and traded in the same way that natural resources such as gold and oil are traded on the global 

stock exchange. 









Megan COPE 

Water is Life I, II, III, IIII, & IIIII 

2020/2021 

framed ink etched and engraved mirror 

series of 5 





Megan COPE 

Untitled (Mangrove Ghosts) I 

2021 

engraved found antique mirror, recycled wharf timber 


Megan COPE 

The Tide Waits for No One 

2020/2021 

kiln cast TV glass yungan/dugong bones, 

minjerribah mineral sand, lightbox 

The Tide Waits For No-One takes us back to the time of early colonisation of Quandamooka country, where 

the hunting of dugong and industrial scale processing became a lucrative marketplace. 

Between 1847 and 1969 the commercial processing of oil, bones, hides and meat occurred with very little 

regard for sustainability, rather Europeans arrived with the perception of ‘Bounteous Seas’ and very little 

recognition of the sophisticated land and sea management systems upheld by the Quandamooka Peoples. 



Megan COPE 

Untitled (Mangrove Ghosts) II 

2021 

engraved found antique mirror, recycled wharf timber 


Exhibition partners 

Canberra Glassworks is supported by the ACT Government through artsACT and the Australian Government through the Australia Council, its arts funding and advisory body. 

We acknowledge the Ngunnawal and Ngambri peoples, the traditional owners of the ACT region, on whose lands we live and work and 

where the Canberra Glassworks stands. We pay respects to their Ancestors, Elders, leaders and artists past and present, and recognise their 

ongoing connections to Culture and Country. We also extend our acknowledgement to all First Nations peoples. 

Cover and back image: 

Megan Cope, The Tide Waits for No One (work 

in progress), 2020/21, cast glass. 

Photography by Brenton McGeachie and Canberra Glassworks 2021. 

Courtesy of the artist, Milani Gallery and Canberra Glassworks. 

This exhibition was supported by Copyright Agency and Australian Council for the Arts Visual Arts and Craft Strategy funding. 

The artist would like to thank Irina Agaronyan, Zena Dawson, Spike Deane, Rose-Mary Faulkner, Alex Frazersmith, Nadina Geary, 

Holly Grace, Rafaella McDonald, Peter Nilsson, Tom Rowney, Hosio Shinhara, Belinda Toll, Sarah Werkeister and Canberra Glassworks staff. 


canberraglassworks.com 

11 Wentworth Ave, Kingston ACT 2604 

T 02 6260 7005 

E contactus@canberraglassworks.com 

opening hours 

Wed to Sun 10am to 4pm

Unbroken Connections catalogue, Canberra Glassworks

You also want an ePaper? Increase the reach of your titles

Delete template?

Save as template?