The Boneyard

The Boneyard is an ambitious year-long project by mid-career Western Australian artist Erin Coates, developed through a residency at Albany’s Historic Whaling Station and anchored in her personal connection to Kinjarling / Albany and her family’s history in shell diving and seafaring. In response to the Whaling Station site and archives, and inspired by the submerged bone piles left by decades of commercial whaling, Coates investigates the entanglement of human and animal histories, weaving together personal family stories, local whaling history, and the fragile relationship between humans and animals. Through cast bronze, sculptural forms, and suspended installation works, The Boneyard reflects on memory, extinction, and regeneration, creating a powerful meditation on the intersection of family narrative, natural history, and the remnants of whaling in Western Australia. - Racquel Cavallaro, Curator