I've been a Relational Artist all along and didn't know it

I've always been a gardener. I can't remember a time when I didn't plant, tend and propagate something or other. Before I moved to the North Shore in search of a large garden, lots of trees and room for my dynamo-of-a-growing-son, I always lived in the inner city in places where the only space to cultivate plants was usually a terracotta pot. Therefore my gardening took shape as a solo activity.

However, when I moved to the leafy street in Chatswood where I've now lived for eight years, I made friends with several neighbours who are also keen garden enthusiasts; two of whom studied Fine Arts at COFA (that's another story), three horticulturists, and a landscape architect. Before long I gave up solo gardening to join this group in swapping plants, joining working bees that take turns working in each other's backyards, teaching and learning from each other about different cultivating methods, setting stalls on our street that give away surplus plants and cuttings to passers-by at different times of the year, as well as giving away unwanted gardening tools and pots.

By taking part in this communal activity, I've made friends, learned more about botany and horticulture than I ever would have on my own, experienced environmental and personal transformation, become involved in wider-community work such as helping clean up parts of the Lane Cove National Park in conjunction with Willoughby Council, and seen how the relational aspect of my street's informal group has inspired newcomers to join us or replicate what they see with groups of their own.

I've always seen a clear link between art and horticulture: they're both about the process of creation, experimentation and revelation. And just as some people are driven to paint, draw, sculpt or take photos every day, there is not a day that goes by (even when it pours rain) when I'm not tending to something in the garden.