Art Pictures

These are not the greatest photos but will give an idea of what I am doing. I am going to take good shots soon to catalogue my latest work and will put some better pics up then. . Dancing Man Eel City The Dust Storm of '83 Steel

LATEST NEWS

I am almost ready to head off to Queensland, will be leaving in three weeks today. I have about 25 pieces of art to pack in to my van and drive to the Sunshine Coast and display them at the Australian Steel Association’s National Conference. There has been a lot to organise and also keeping in mind that I am planning an exhibition in Melbourne for the 22nd. July. The next few months will tell if it going to be viable to keep going along this path. I am creating some nice work and I can see my style developing so am hoping that the next two shows will be successful.. I am missing Helen and the kids although I would not have been able to achieve what I have in the last seven or so weeks without leading the life that I am at the moment. I am very lucky to have such a great place to stay and work, Matt and Soph are very accommodating and I try to pull my weight as much as I can and not be a burden to them. It sounds like Tal and Rennie are having a great time in Scotland. Tal is very popular at school, so popular in fact that one of the girls in his class will not leave him alone and the boys are taking turns at lunch time to guard him!! The kids have a lot of freedom, different to how it was for them in Melbourne. Helen is having a bit of a hard time, There is no child care on the Island and she has to look after Jarra full time. There is also not a lot to do on Mull, so with the weather as it is over there her options to amuse him are quite limited. I am planning to head over there in early August hopefully in time for Tal’s 10th birtday. Wow, I can’t believe he is turning 10…… Will keep you posted about my progress on my odyssey North.

FRIDAY THE 13th.

The weather has been lovely, although a bit of rain would be quite welcome. The drought continues in earnest, dominating the news and conversations country wide. So I took the kayak down to the river to take advantage of the lovely conditions and paddled along the Gellibrand towards the river mouth. It is a beautiful and peaceful way to travel, accompanied by the sounds of various birds in the tall reeds which line the banks, the splash of the paddles and the rippling of the bow wave as the kayak cuts its way through. On the return leg, approaching Princetown, a car was putting in a jet-ski at the boat ramp just next to the old bridge and had some trouble getting back up. I stayed to watch, a bit of free entertainment for the afternoon. He was pretty well stuck, the exhaust pipe of the white station wagon was underwater and was bubbling away, making a funny noise like blowing a straw into a glass of water. The girl who was with him was looking a bit worried. A guy with a ute tried to tow him out but his wheels were spinning. I mentioned that I had a 4WD up the road but no way to get there. Ben offered to take me to it on the jet-ski. Cool. We flew up the river from where I had paddled and in about 2 minutes we covered the distance it had taken me about 40 minutes to paddle, great fun. I drove the ute to the ramp and hooked up and towed him out. As Ben’s car made it on to level ground he shouted “SHIIIIT”. His car had filled with water while sitting with its back in the river and it all rushed forward as the car levelled out, gushing out the doors. He was taking this girl out for the first time and I do not like his chances for a second date. She got her bag out from the front passengers floor and pulled her dripping wet digital camera out, but luckily her mobile phone was spared. I put the kayak back on the 4WD, I had probably had enough by then anyway and was saved the paddle home, so all in all a fun afternoon for me!

KEBABS

The Easter weekend at Kangaroobie is an annual event. Many folk come up here from Melbourne and help to herd all the cattle into the stock yards so that we can separate the cows from their calves and do what needs doing. The cattle need drenching and the calves need to be ear tagged and injected and the boys need their tackle removed. It is an experience to be amongst a herd of 1000kg animals, persuading them to go where we want them to. They are a funny creature the cow, imagine weighing more than ten times as much as something and being frightened of it? The noise of them all mooing is a strange and surreal sensation as we push them into the yards. Each calf is put through the “race”, the narrow fenced section that runs through the stock yard, it puts them into single file so we can deal with each one in turn. If it is a girl it gets tagged in the right ear as it is squeezed inside the crush, then a couple of injections and off she goes. The boys are a different matter. As well as all that, Matt gets his sharp knife and bending over behind the unfortunate creature slices and cuts and removes the reproductive bits. It is a pretty swift operation. But hey, they do not go to waste, oh no. As an entrée to the evenings cocktail party (an appropriate title) the bits were threaded onto skewers and spiced. Moroccan style kebabs were then barbequed and sampled by most. An unusual texture and psychologically challenging, but not too bad. The things you do on a farm……..

Eel Festival

LAKE BOLAC EEL FESTIVAL

The Eel Festival at Lake Bolac was an interesting event. Not quite as big as what I imagined, but being only the third year it can only get bigger and better. The quality of the music was fantastic and I am sure it will attract a larger audience in the future. Unfortunately Lake Bolac is pretty dry, being a salt lake means that the salinity is double what it should be and subsequently most of the eels have died. It was an important place for the Aborigines in the past, a gathering place to harvest the eels. I bumped into a couple of people I knew. Robyn who we bought our bus from was there with her two boys (Hi guys!) and it was great to catch up. She gave me a hard time about not keeping the blog up to date, so here you are!! Also bumped into a guy who came to Camp years ago, Ian from the band Suade. I took along a couple of pieces to show in their art exhibition. I made a piece called “Eel Festival” which the Committee of the Festival bought and want to use in their promotions for next year which I was really happy about. So if you are interested I would recommend going to the Festival next year, I hope to see you there.