Page 1886 - Week 06 - Wednesday, 8 June 2022

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are also the recent beneficiaries of Daana restaurant in Curtin’s Karma Kitchen, thanks to the Rotary Club of Woden Daybreak.

Also at the expo were Sense Rugby—this is a club that is working with people with all types of additional needs, including sensory issues, to be able to participate in team sports like rugby—and the Disability Trust, an NDIS provider who runs in-home support, social groups and support work. There were many more organisations there who were also learning about inclusive programming to help break down the barriers to accessible sports and recreation for children in Canberra.

I would like to recognise the work of Grace West from Woden Community Service as a key member of the expo planning team and the project manager for Molonglo Movers, who you may have read about recently in Riotact. They are an inclusively led sports and arts program for children and young people. Thank you also to Katie, Lynton and everyone at Woden Community Service and Northside Community Service, and to the Woden School for creating an opportunity for people of all abilities to find the right sports and recreation group for them, where they can be creative and active and have fun together.

Ms Fay Skyring—tribute

MS CHEYNE (Ginninderra—Assistant Minister for Economic Development, Minister for the Arts, Minister for Business and Better Regulation, Minister for Human Rights and Minister for Multicultural Affairs) (5.47): On the weekend I was delighted but also particularly honoured to be part of the Canberra Spinners and Weavers’ launch of their annual members exhibition, called “Warped and Twisted”. But, more than that, Madam Speaker, it was also a very significant occasion in that the exhibition gallery there was named for Ms Fay Skyring OAM. I would like to share a little bit about Fay today and why that is so important, as well as to talk briefly about the exhibition, which continues this week.

Fay was a weaver, a teacher, a mentor, a collaborator and an inspirer. She played a significant role in arts and crafts, weaving, textiles and visual arts in Canberra and, indeed, the nation. She was an incredible artist. She had an incredible artistic talent but was also incredibly gifted. It was not only her gifts in what she created but also her gifts in what she shared with others, which is absolutely her enduring legacy to this day.

Members might know that her works feature throughout galleries, churches, art centres and, most notably, Parliament House. She was quite specifically commissioned back in the mid-1980s to produce handwoven fabrics to adorn the settings of the major parliamentary suites in the new Parliament House, including the Prime Minister’s office, the Leader of the Opposition’s office and the Speaker’s suite. She did so with imagination, expertise and incredible finesse, in collaboration with Di Lansdown. This work was so successful that she was commissioned three more times to reproduce it, which is 650 metres in total.

This is all documented in a documentary that was commissioned by the Canberra Museum and Gallery about a decade ago called The Warp and the Weft. It is available


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