Welcome to my new website. And an important thank you. / by Laura Woodward

Thank you for dropping by; I hope you are enjoying perusing this new-look website.

I must admit, however, that I have had little to do with its manifestation. My inimitable studio assistant, Sarah Jane Haywood, has built this beautiful beast from scratch: working for several months to move more than a decade's worth of practice and documentation from the old site to the new; as well as adding new sections to cover my growing research practice and to incorporate my (oft neglected) blog (which one hopes will be less so now that it is more readily accessible within this site).

So, this is a long way of saying: thank you for the website Sarah.

However, to leave it at that is to leave out the many other thanks that are owed to Sarah Jane. Sarah has worked in many capacities with me for several years now (including running our CNC machine at Like Butter, being an amazing contributor in her role in Rising: the Victoria Harbour Young Artist Initiative, and generally being involved in the mad rush up to every exhibition I have had for the past five years. She even MC'ed our wedding last year!). Sarah officially moved into an ongoing role as my assistant two years ago. This means that she is still on the mad rush up to every exhibition (of course), which now includes supervising and training others in the idiosyncrasies (and infuriations) of kinetic sculpture assembly and installation. She also assists with many other things, particularly the day-to-day running of Ironside Studios. In 2015 Sarah put her strengths in media and social media to work, undertaking a dedicated media campaign to promote my exhibition "Writhe" at Ararat Regional Art Gallery, securing numerous publication outcomes in the process. And of course she built this site.

In short: Sarah is an amazing young woman who has contributed significantly to my practice over the last five years. Her strength and care carries through everything, both in working relationships and in the work itself. It is a delight to have worked with her now for so many years and in so many capacities. For some reason (ahem) we always find ourselves in intense situations: from the month that was Lorne, to working with the wonderful Rising students. Sarah's approach - her calm, her humour, her intelligence, her friendship, her many and varied skills, and her grace under (often various and overlapping) pressures - has been invaluable to me over the years. It has also been a pleasure seeing Sarah's own practice grow, as these same strengths manifest in her astonishing, humbling works

So, thank you Sarah. And here's to another amazing year ahead!