Summary

Icon created for and displayed at the Women on Farms Gathering, Yarra Valley 2000.

This horseshoe represents the large number of horses in the Yarra Valley, and offered good luck to the next committee. The horse shoe from Yarra Valley challenged women to 'dare to dream'. Kay Thomas provided the horseshow from her much beloved horse of twenty years, Isaac. Many people in the district knew Isaac. He was a very gentle horse and was fond of putting his head in visitor's laps, or poking his nose inside car windows when Kay stopped to talk to friends while out riding. Sadly Isaac was injured in a fall and had to be put down.

'The object represented the large number of horses in the Yarra Valley. A majority of the committee also owned horses. It was Kay Thomas who first wanted to host a gathering in the Yarra Valley. Through the horseshoe she wanted to hand on our good luck to the next committee. Kay paints and decorates horseshoes.' - Dianne McIntyre, Yarra Valley.

The closing of each Gathering and the anticipation of the next is celebrated with a formal 'baton changing' ritual, where a symbolic 'icon' is handed over from one organising committee to the next. Each item represents a story or message of some of the key themes and issues, which have shaped the meaning and experience of these women's rural identity.

Part of Museums Victoria's Invisible Farmer Project Collection. The Invisible Farmer Project was the largest ever study of Australian women on the land, uncovering the histories and stories of Australian women in agriculture and addressing the absence of rural women in mainstream histories and museums. It began as a pilot project (2015-2016) and evolved into a three year (2017-2020) nation-wide partnership between rural communities, academic, government and cultural organisations, funded by the Australian Research Council.

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