Onkaparinga Arts - Sauerbier House

17/06/2026

Celebrating 10 Years! 🎉

Throwback | BUTTERGIRL (Kim Shanahan)

Artist in Residence, 4 April - 1 July 2017

"... and, when it was melted, ree swallowed it" - My research and focus of my Art Residency at Sauerbier House has been directly concerned with migration of the Calidris Acuminata, the tiny Sharp Tailed Sandpiper, and in fact the female of the species the “Ree”. This Bird annually migrates from the Arctic Siberia to the Onkaparinga River of South Australia, in search of tasty, nourishing, plump worms, molluscs and crustaceans. It flies in large flocks often with other waders. Their departure is highly organised with the male of the species leaving first, to be followed by the females and finally by the young. There is much secrecy, and still so much unknown about the liminal space they journey. When the Sharp Tailed Sandpiper’s have feasted on the splendours of the Onkaparinga region they will once again fly back to the tundras of Siberia to breed. The females incubate the eggs in well hidden hollows on the ground and raise their young alone. I too have journeyed from my home in Katherine in the Northern Territory of Australia to undertake my residency at Sauerbier house… weekly I have prepared myself for long flights and emotional departures from family, my experience has paralleled that of the tiny shore bird I research… I have wandered the banks of the Ngangkiparingga (Onkaparinga) that is symbolised as a Coolamon (a Kaurna Woman’s Large Dish or Bowl) I respectfully acknowledge this, as I have searched tirelessly for the exact place that the fresh water meets the salt, and it is here that I have stood beside a single, female Sharp Tailed Sandpiper that didn’t return to Siberia with her flock, and it is her story I tell…

Images: Suzanne Muston

17/06/2026

Last Days to view Christobel Kelly’s series of luminous paintings and sculptural works. THIN PLACES examines the premise to ‘practice the past’ highlighting the rich artistic legacy of South Australia.

Exhibition ends this Saturday 20 June 4pm.

15/06/2026

Celebrating 10 Years! 🎉

Throwback | Rosemary Whitehead

Artist in Residence, 25 March - 29 April 2017

Rosemary is a textile and colour environmentalist whose weaving of large and small tapestries; collaging of love-song sheets; clothing of hangers and construction of beauteous nets have regenerated donated, discarded or found fabric and objects. Many of her works are inspired by the texts she has read and the people she has met and since 1999 much of her work has been informed by the place she calls home -- Kangaroo Island. Having first fell in love with the landscape around Port Noarlunga while attending a tapestry weaving residential summer school at Tatachilla in 1976, Rosemary fell in love all over again while at Sauerbier House, working towards a ruminative exhibition and through generously skill sharing the many textile processes she has learnt over the last 40 years. Her work explores the inseparable connection between art and life via the domestic opportunities which fabrics afford us.

Images: Suzanne Mustan.

13/06/2026

Celebrating 10 Years! 🎉

Throwback | Nic Brown

Artist in Residence, Oct-Dec 2016
THEN CAME THE CLOUD BURST

"The great looping arc of the Onkaparinga River estuary at Port Noarlunga has always been a landmark, a place that I watch out for when driving along the nearby road. Any place on earth where salt water meets fresh water, where still water faces the sky, is a place for reflection, reverie and storytelling. Sauerbier House, built in 1897, is located right on the Onkaparinga River estuary and the stories of the Kaurna custodians of this area featured in a previous residency and exhibition in which Lisa Harms worked with Ngankiburka Mekauwe (Senior Woman Of Water) Georgina Williams at length, demonstrating many entry points to the long-term significance of this place. Everyone must know by now that the Onkaparinga is a women’s river. Its Kaurna name is Ngangkiparingga, meaning ‘Women’s River’. The importance to all South Australians of knowing more about both the deep and more recent past of where they live is part of the purpose of Sauerbier House as “a centre for developing and promoting arts practices, supporting and strengthening the creative cultural expression of the region”.

Images: SH

13/06/2026

Celebrating 10 Years! 🎉

Throwback | Margit Brünner
IT'S NOW FOR NOW

Artist in Residence, 25 February - 29 March 2017

IT'S NOW FOR NOW - 'If we prioritize joy, will we be generating paradise?' Artist in Residence 25 February - 29 March 2017 • The Sauerbier House Residency presented the artist Margit Brünner with the opportunity to further investigate the aesthetic and ethic potential and effects of joy-production. Margit’s practice is motivated by a firm belief that we become and co-emerge in relation to others and the course of our becoming matters. To put joy-based exercise in perspective Brunner borrows from the Dutch philosopher Baruch Spinoza, who suggested that we are partaking in the dynamics of a highly affective universe, where each and everyone's expressions, including those of ants, plants, minerals, thoughts,... have an effect on the whole.
Margit used of the residency to make visible fragments of joy through performative drawing and installations, responding to the encountered environments at Sauerbier House and its surroundings

Images Courtesy Suzanne Mustan.

12/06/2026

WILD TEXTILE & CERAMIC WORKSHOP | Libby Rose & Joseph Boas.
Saturday 25 July 1:15 PM - 3:45 PM
Libby Rose Artist Joe Boas
Join Libby and Joe for a hands-on generous skill sharing workshop unpacking some of the discoveries, processes, and developments that have emerged throughout their residency at Sauerbier House.

In this workshop, participants will create a Japanese-style knot bag and a Wabi Sabi inspired wild clay vase.

The Japanese style bag will incorporate Libby’s eco printed textiles developed during the residency, featuring sheoak, casuarina, and bark gathered from the surrounding forest. Participants will be provided with beautiful piece of cut fabric from which to sew the bag. Some machine sewing experience may be helpful.

To create the vase Joseph will provide wild clays and guide participants to learn hand rolled clay techniques and the use of botanical textures.

The workshop will also include afternoon refreshments and informal discussion with Libby and Joe about their individual practices, collaborative processes, and the work developed throughout the residency and exhibition. Both Joseph and Libby share a deep love for working alongside nature, to continually explore the textures, marks, and stories held within natural materials.

All materials included
Best suit creatives over 18
Some sewing machine experience would be helpful
Afternoon tea provided
$80 for the afternoon
Bookings: https://www.trybooking.com/DMSDD

Image: Wabi Sabi vase & Japanese style knot bag. Courtesy Artists.

11/06/2026

ONKAPARINGA BROOCH WEAVING WORKSHOP with Valerie Kirk
Saturday 27 June | 10:00 AM - 12:00 PM


Join Valerie for a unique and memorable small works weaving workshop to create a woven brooch inspired by the river, land, or sea. A strong thread will be stretched across a small piece of foam core board to create the warp. Using a darning needle, coloured yarns will then be woven into shapes, forming the image. A brooch pin can be attached so the piece can be worn or taken home as a personal creative work.

$50 per participant - includes all materials along with morning tea.
Best suit participants 12 +.
Under 18 must be accompanied by participating adult.
Tickets: https://www.trybooking.com/DMEUE

Image: Valerie Kirk, Brooch weaving workshop, 2026, medium needle weaving. Image courtesy Artist.

10/06/2026

Celebrating 10 Years! 🎉

Throwback | Eileen Lubiana

Artist in Residence, Oct-Dec 2016
FRAGILE

During this residency Eileen Lubiana has explored what we as a society ‘value’. A trip to Italy highlighted the extent and value of that region’s cultural heritage, a place filled with centuries of artistic endeavour. In Australia, for many people and especially the First Nation people, it is the very land that we stand on that is of significant value. This juxtaposition is explored in numerous ways throughout the exhibition. Eileen elevates the natural world of dried seaweed and remnant grasses into evocative objects. Playing with notions of water and light, a construct of green glass mirrors the ebb and flow of a living seabed under the waves, whole and resplendent compared to the tumbled pieces so often found in the sand. Water and sand are poetically represented as Eileen’s moving images ebb with the tidal flow of beach and water. The exhibition culminates with a large scale diptych ‘fragile’, hosting a European statue, a guardian, positioned on the sand hills close to the mouth of the Onkaparinga River, standing within the Tjirbruke Story, his sand tracks painted in ochre. The values held within old traditions are blended. Eileen’s work seeks to focus attention on the beauty and fragility of our natural environment in the face of climate change and the loss of open space and by highlighting this fragility, inspires people to contribute in caring for it.

Image: SH

10/06/2026

10/06/2026

SAMPLING THE WORLD - Embroidery workshop with Sera Waters.
Come and join Sera for an afternoon of experimental embroidery sampling. Saturday 18 July 1:30 - 3:30 PM


Samplers, before they became ‘embroidery exercises’, were places to innovatively develop stitching knowledge and possibilities. In this workshop participants will begin their sampler based upon finding and responding to patterns in and around Sauerbier House. Throughout the workshop we will experiment with common embroidery stitches, reawakening samplers as a site to practice, document our times and places, and play with the many thousands stitched possibilities.

Some basic embroidery experience necessary.
BYO fabric on which to stitch your sampler.
Sera can provide hoops, a range of threads, scissors, needles, washable markers, reference texts/embroidery guides for the duration of the workshop. If you have your own hoop and favourite threads and materials, please bring them with you.
Best suit folks 18+.
Afternoon refreshments included.
Cost: $50.00
Tickets:https://www.trybooking.com/DMGJJ

Photograph by Sia Duff. Courtesy of Guildhouse