Created by artist Janenne Willis, Nature Obituary transforms the landscape into a reflective space for care, connection and feeling. Vintage writers’ desks will line the lakeside on the Princes Lawn in Royal Botanic Gardens Melbourne, eco pens and paper atop. These desks will face the open sky, inviting attendees to pen an obituary for any part of nature they feel drawn to honour. Simultaneously, spoken word artists Tariro Mavondo, Serious Meerkat and Janenne Willis will read aloud obituaries from an evolving library of reflections.

This intimate and connective experience is a call to care and a space for ecological grief. Participant created reflections are woven together with commissioned contributions from First Nations writers, whose perspectives bring profound cultural insight into the relationship between land and waters, care and connection.

Evoking reflections on environmental degradation and meaning, this moving experience inspires active hope, deeper action and a commitment to nurturing nature amid the climate and biodiversity emergency.

More about the experience

Attend one of the Nature Obituary sessions to write and / or listen to obituaries for parts of nature now lost.

Contribute your voice by writing a personal obituary honouring a part of the natural world you feel connected to— a species, place, or memory. Writers will be offered all writing materials along with one of two paths: free writing or responding to creative writing prompts. Once completed, participants can choose to place their piece under a stone paperweight, creating an evolving library of reflections for spoken word artists to read live. Listeners are welcome to be in the live readings space for as little or as long as they feel called.

Free, all welcome.