Lines of Fire
Rachel Moody

We will never defeat fire in this country, so we have to use it as a tool and adapt.

My proposal is to create an environment that uses the very force of fire to help reduce anxiety amongst our citizens in relation to unpredictable natural events. Lines of Fire is an urban architectural intervention that provides psychological relief through the open expression of strong emotions, causing catharsis, bringing some form of positive change to an individual’s life.

“Australia will have to adapt to a more flammable future” – this will require more than just new approaches to land, fire, and emergency management. It will also require new, transformative approaches to building community and personal resilience.

Lines of Fire delivers great public space by creating a place combining experience, testing, research, the community, and Rural Fire Service (RFS) under one umbrella to work collaboratively to provide solutions to deal with our emotions about our changing climate and make us better prepared for future weather events. A place that facilitates the gathering of a community that normally do not interact, allowing them to build resilience, knowledge, and a stronger sense of self-worth individually and/or collectively.

The act of burning and regeneration that makes this site unique teaches people to be ready for the unpredictable and gives them opportunities to grow from it. The program explores how human resilience takes multidimensional forms and meanings, by looking at its intuitive response to extreme adversity and/or acute stress that is observable across the course of one’s life.