Was this the original green roof lining?

And so, just before the roof was sealed up for the flue and chimney, I took this photograph of the hole revealing the double roof layer. Not a bad thing to have two layers, but how the church now functions with a good stove will determine what other kind of insulation we need in the roof and on the windows.

After the first day of the wood heaters operation it was fantistic to feel the heat rising up into the mezzanine level. This means that the church has the potential to be used all the year instead just the warmer months. Heating is the issue here, in Queensland it was cooling, and we are now entering into our first Tasmanian winter-not as bitter as in the UK, but cold nonetheless.

The greening of the pod

Now the plasters are finished, the painting is-more or less complete. Unexpectedly the pod turned green! Finding a colour took much deliberation and changes of mind until one sunny morning in the beginning of July, Pat and I realised the colour would be apple green. On the wall under the window, was a record of the layers of paint built up over time, and the green we chose corresponded to one of those colours. The colour then is both from a contemporary palette and the heritage of the church. For us perhas, it also signifies apples and politics. Here, Greer helps us out with the painting before the builders return.

One more layer of the church's history was unexpectedly revealed on the 15th july when we installed a new wood stove. As the installers penetrated the roof to take the flue, it was clear that the baltic pine ceiling was a later addition to the original roof which was also painted apple green. We are keeping a piece of the wide pine boards( 9 inches) covered in the pale green paint that had been concealed by the warm orange glow of baltic pine boards which we had presumed to be the original roof lining. Were these later boards added at time the church hall was built around 1900? Is this pale green the colour first brushed on around 1860 or is that just another, later addition? The Church continues to surprise us.

Some notes about what we are planning to do

We envisage that our annual program will be a combination of professional practice and community cultural development which is in keeping with our backgrounds. We want the church to be used regularly, thereby enabling it to be conserved and we want to continue our practices in our retirement. We will not be profit making but hope to generate enough income from some of the activities to maintain use of the church by ourselves and other artists throughout the year.

Projects we are planning so far include a bursury program for visual art post graduate students with the selected artist undertaking a residency in the church studio, a social history project to collect and present the stories of people who were married in the church, a floating paper kiln project - paper kilns are constructed and floated on the Huon River - small pots are fired in them. We also plan to run occassional short workshops, give talks and present exhibitions. Some projects may culminate in an exhibition or installation. We are open to taking small regional touring exhibitions and to other types of residencies e.g. writing.

We expect to run our first bursury residency program later this year.