Good art doesn't just depict history, it challenges how we understand it. I congratulate Zoe Bakker from Lake Macquarie High School, who has achieved exactly that, through the creation of her major HSC Visual Arts work titled 'You'd Have To Stop the World Just to Stop the Feeling'. Zoe's goal was to produce a work that challenged modern assumptions about queer identity, and in particular the notion that LGBTQIA+ people are a product of modern society. She achieved this through a series of paintings, depicting well known women throughout history in intimate poses. Inspired by artists such as Alphonse Mucha, Zoe's work features Sappho, Wu Tsao, Josephine Baker, Anne Bonny, Julie d'Aubigny, and Emily Dickinson and uses a recurring floral motif to tie the individual canvases together symbolising resilience, femininity and the endurance of sapphic love across centuries. Zoe's artwork, and the complex ideas behind it, were so impressive that it was selected for inclusion in the First Class 2025 exhibition at the Museum of Art and Culture, Yapang, in Booragul—one of just 28 works chosen from more than 180 submissions from across the region. Congratulations Zoe.