Back Home, In the Water
SCREENWORKS

Back Home, In the Water
2025, moving image work, looped. 

“I remember visiting this place all the time, up in Gimuy on Djabugay Country. Walking up the impossibly steep hill as a child, all the way up there, where the waterfalls splash. Always letting the water embrace me, even in the self-consciousness of youth. Wavering on the edges as an adult and always always always thinking about when my next visit might be. 

Decades later, it has the same soundscape: steady water, families laughing in nearby rockpools, birds flying to their homes overhead. I’m sure they can smell the freshwater and know they are home, just like me. We’d all become temporary neighbours, basking in the sun, made even warmer by the encircling rainforest. 

Just splash some water on yourself if it gets too hot. 

Though I’m over 2,000 kilometers away now, this is one of my homes – this place, these moments. I’m collecting homes, like colourful fridge magnets; Cairns, Melbourne, Alabama; the rockpools and beaches; my grandparents’ old house, a long street I once walked up and down everyday, an old set of eyes. Other places, still. 

A moment like this is captured here in this moving image – folks slowly entering the bubbling water, taking their time and feeling at home despite the cold shock of the water. The water is always hurriedly flowing, but makes space for these visitors, curving around their bodies. A very wet hug.” 

-Savi Ross, 2025 

ABOUT THE ARTIST:
 

Savi Ross is an African American, Torres Strait Islander artist, excited by digital illustration, creative storytelling, and Black joy. Savi was born and raised in Gimuy (Cairns) and now lives and works on Wurundjeri Country in Narrm (Melbourne). Savi’s work is often inspired by these places; the hugging mountains of Cairns and slow life as a young person in the 2000s; and the vibrancy of Naarm—two places that are in many ways different and sometimes similar. Often Savi’s illustrations are expressed through printed materials, to think about what community means; our public vs private lives; and the complexities of family, bodies, and intimacy. 

This work was originally commissioned by Blindside Gallery through the Screen Series program – curated by Solid Lines with Agency Projects. 

 
ABOUT SCREENWORKS: 

SCREENWORKS provides a dedicated screen space for video and moving-image work for Gasworks’ creative community. Each month a different work will be shown, celebrating the dynamism that screen-based media can offer. 

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