News | January 2026 The Tide Wanderer

Nestled amongst the dunes at Cremorne - a small beachside town situated on The South Arm of the Derwent River in Tasmania lies a waterfront hideaway known as Sand Temple - a place surrounded by water.

To the east Frederick Henry Bay with its long sandy beach made for silent walking is blessed by the rising sun as dawn breaks. To the west Pipe Clay Lagoon is ruled by the ebb and flow of tides, the drama of moody sunsets and the strong presence of Mt Wellington on the horizon.

At high tide Sand Temple becomes inaccessible by road giving it a sense of mysterious and magical isolation - a place for all kinds of imagining. I felt drawn to the lagoon at the hour of low tide as it revealed a secret world of polished shiny things - mudlarking time for a thousand tiny birds - a rabble of squawk and peck and fossick. As the days passed I too began to fossick, becoming a tide wanderer returning to the shack in the last of the light - my pockets damp and gritty with treasure from the path I had walked.

And so it was that ideas for a work titled The Tide Wanderer began to form in response to a request by the owners for an art work to hang in this place which means so much to me. The work begins as I shape a collaged garment of patched collectables that hold the spirit of place.

The Tide Wanderer

I wear this as a second skin remembering what it is to walk at low tide following in the footsteps of The Tide Wanderer.
A garment of rags and tatters — patched collectables of all that shimmers at my feet
— etched by the grit and wash of ebb and flow as the lagoon empties itself of the day.
As I walk I feel the eternal rhythms of circle and return — the tide within me — I am of the tide — we are of the same essence.

Jo Sabey