An elsewhere world: the sleepy Tasmanian mining town that became an arts mecca

Queenstown is a confusing place. The town is located in a valley with bare, sterile mountains and a river that looks like pumpkin soup. The scars are from the mine, which is why the town was created.

Raymond Arnold, a Tasmanian artist, described Queenstown’s approach as descending into another world. It is hidden in the ancient dark rainforest on Tasmania’s wild West Coast.

He says, “It is the Mount Arrowsmith Portal.” The geology changes. You’re changing one bedrock to another. But it’s more than just physical. It’s also emotional and psychological. “I’ve always felt unburdened and free here.”

Artists are awakening the area from its hibernation now that the mine is in hibernation. The Tasmanian arts community is lining up to get a piece of Queenie. There are grand old buildings that have been neglected and show signs of wealth that have long since disappeared.

In the 1860s, government geologists stumbled through Arnold’s Portal and found immense riches. Mount Lyell Mining and Railway Company, formed in 1893, operated one of the largest copper mines in the world. The company also built a town and a railway.

The town’s fortunes have fluctuated over the years, and the locals developed a special connection with the altered landscape. The 1990s saw the city so attached to the bare hills that had been left by acid rain for decades that they even opposed mine efforts to re-vegetate.

Robert Sticht, an American metallurgist who was one of Tasmania’s wealthiest men, became the first manager of the company. The magnate was a lover of art and filled the fine house he built on the hillside with rare books, art, and Albrecht Durer woodcuts.

Arnold reflects today on Sticht’s “Faustian role” in ruining the Queenstown Valley. Arnold, an internationally renowned printmaker and artist, is credited for sparking Queenstown’s arts-led revival. He settled in the outpost with Helena Demczuk, an internationally famous artist.

They established an art residency program there that hosted Australians and international artists and staged over 50 exhibitions. A visiting student purchased a $2,500 house in the town two decades ago.

Arnold says, “It was quite a violent place.” “An angry local blew up the fuel station. Someone got burned out and destroyed a home. “That hard edge has now melted away.”

Arnold’s next project will be a workshop inside an old school. He is also in discussions with the city council to develop social housing in an abandoned Art Deco building.

Arnold was the catalyst of the arts boom, but a festival, according to him, was what resolutely changed the town.

He says that “Unconformity” has brought Queenstown the same success as Mona had in Hobart.

The Unconformity began in 2009 when the town was still dependent on the mine. The Unconformity was founded by volunteers, including Travis Tiddy from Queenstown, who went to art school before returning to Queenstown to explore the landscape.

Tiddy recalls, “None had worked on a music festival before.”

Queenstown Heritage and Arts Festival was initially well received. Tiddy says, “We began to understand how arts can transform a place.” “It’s a wonderful outcome for a town with a dormant mining industry for over a decade that people are moving here to be part of the cultural scene.”

Tiddy is the artistic director at The Unconformity. The festival holds a bi-annual event and offers programs, including an artist-in-residence program for local school children, who now consider arts as a profession rather than mining.

Emma Bugg is an artist who bought property in Queenstown when she realized that Hobart was out of her price range. She says, “I ended with a church-and-hall which was a little bit of a surprise.”

I love the contrast of the landscape. It’s raw, rugged and brutal. You drive 10 minutes, and you are in the rainforest. If you fall asleep or lie down, you will be sucked into it.

Kirsha Kaechele, an American curator and artist, celebrated her birthday in November with David Walsh, owner of Mona, and 40 friends.

She says, “The rule said you had to wear cowboy clothing for three days.” There were posters all over the town of me.

She recalls her days as a young, aspiring artist in Berlin and New Orleans. She says, “There are so many abandoned buildings and a community that is downtrodden in such a magnificent location.” “Anywhere where there’s been an economic collapse is a dream for artists.”

Kaechele purchases land for a 24 Carrot Garden, her program that teaches children how to grow and prepare healthy food.

The gentrification in Queenie will inevitably send real estate prices skyward. Brian Ritchie of the Violent Femmes alt-rock group was present at the recent auction held by the council to recover unpaid rates. Mountain bikers were vying for land to build his tiny home. He lost out.

Bugg bemoans that mountain bikers “are so loaded.”

Shane Pitt is the mayor of West Coast Council, which is based in Queenstown. He says that the auction brought in four times more than expected. He says that the town has changed significantly. “We’ve witnessed arts and culture taking over.”

Camera crews are also drawn to the other-worldly landscape. Following the SBS neo-noir series The Tailings and Paramount+ adventure The Bridge series, ABC’s Bay of Fires uses Queenstown and Zeehan nearby as a background. Marta Dusseldorp has also purchased a home. She is the lead actor, creator, and producer.

Anthony Coulson, a former miner who has now become a tourism operator, is renovating the Art Deco Paragon Theatre in Queenstown. As a child growing up in Queenstown, he witnessed the “end” of the old ways of brass marching band music and drinking and smoking.

He says the change came about after the blockade of the Franklin River in the early 80s, which was a crucial battle that led to the formation of the Greens party and the protection of vast areas of wilderness. “We realised that we couldn’t keep tearing up the wilderness. It was our biggest asset,” says he.

Coulson, who has lived through many booms and busts, says that this time is different. He says that mining is no longer a silver bullet. This is the new Queenstown.