water debris

© PAOLA TALBERT   Gyre 8   2012  60 x 60cm   awarded Highly Commended at the 2012 GreenWay Art Prize

Above photograph shows a fragment of an everyday urban detritus so beautifully enticing but revealing a part of our human disconnect. This work is from Paola Talbert's newest series Gyre, an ocean vortex, where originally full of plankton now collects millions of kilos of rubbish... our rubbish! Here is a good link with more information on what they call the Great Pacific Garbage Patch - a landfill in the ocean.

Your piece Paola is an exquisite example of the beauty and the foul aspects of this wonderful and absurd world we live in! Thank you

GreenWay Arts Prize

Above is my rejected version of along Hawthorne Canal made for the 2012 Greenway Arts Prize Exhibition. The opening was on last night  with another full house at Art Est and tomorrow I will be there again to guide a free art workshop with a nod towards sustainability from 10am to 1pm. This is for our first GreenWay Hub Day...  

GreenWay festivities coming soon

Saturday 23 June  GreenWay Hub Day from 10 - 1pm at Canal Road Leichhardt near Cafe Bones


free activities: 
Bike skills training and tune ups
Kids blinging up bikes
GreenWay Food with Bike Tour
Walking tour - dog friendly - to the GreenWay Arts Exhibition at Art EST  
Sustainability art workshop at Art EST 


bookings and more details here

Story at Branch

Story starting with the letter B

Branch3d

April 30th - May 26        

9am - 8pm everyday       

26 Ross St Forest Lodge

Have a look at this fabulous space for art, design and architecture to connect with an everyday thoroughfare. More details at Branch3d. I wish that more windows around town could be used in a creative way. The work here was a playful interlude from my studio works and a lovely opportunity to make art merging with the suburbs.

Through a window, through the branches, on the tree top

birds, brooms, brushes

here we are reflected

past and future imaginings

together with abundant possibilities

suspended pages quietly in shadow and line

removed from Nature, held in museums and books

the birdsong mixed with the ordinary and disowned,

remnants of the human world.

http://www.birdlife.org/community/2011/10/a-call-to-action-for-australian-birds/

A big thanks to Sarah Nolan, artist and director of Branch

and to the Macleay Museum, University of Sydney for a wealth of history and inspiration

(admission free, open 7 days and just up the road!)

Insight Out of Sight

Last night was the announcement of the winners of the  Insight Out of Sight competition - a Leichhardt Council initiative with their Community Development Officer Bronwyn Tuohy. First place winner captured above at Birchgrove Oval was by the charming Neil Tomkins. The idea is to invite artists of all sorts to bring colour and interest to traffic signal boxes that are often covered in snoresville tagging. Why I know so much (my reward on left) was because I was given the honour of being one of the judges for this year and I have always been such a fan of this fun approach to liven our streets. Please have look around or at the link above.... and maybe you would like to enter next year?

long-nose bandicoot at Macleay Museum

Carmel Wallace detail of Colony at Brenda May Gallery

I love going to the old world Macleay Museum at the University of Sydney as their collection covers many interesting areas about history and stuff through the stuffed. I often go specifically to view their bird specimens for my art practice and recently spotted the above critter, a long-nosed bandicoot (in the centre).  I do recommend a visit and amongst the permanent displays is their next curated exhibition called Coral: Art Science Life

more posts about the long-nosed bandicoot here and here 

did you hear about the fab workshops?

on the mantelpiece are collages by Rochelle Summerfield 

  
Thirning Villa is where Ashfield Council houses their artist in residence programme and this weekend I have just completed a free workshop conducted by the newest artist on the block. 


You can find more on Rochelle Summerfield's blog and all her links. 


Workshops on printmaking techniques are open to all and there will be plenty to choose from so contact  Ashfield Council for details and to make bookings. 

here I printed a collagraph of "litter" over a fragment of an etching... its a great technique.

artists' books at Leichhardt Library

Curve Test - waste nothing is a constructed artist book made during an all day stay in a waiting room. I liked the idea of making this piece within the time I had and with materials I picked up from around this site (except the needle for stitching and the orange marker). The work may look junky but I see it more as a fun and real snapshot or record of a day that could occur for anyone. I do see beauty in the banal and hope others may tune into this too. 

ps no one was harmed during the making of this "book".

JCA Steel Bookbinders competition exhibition presented by NSW Guild of Craft Bookbinders 

at Leichhardt Library on until 30th Jan 2012

bright days to all for 2012

suburban fireworks

above you might be able to just see the annual procession through Ashfield Park towards prime positioning for firework viewing - the distant red lights in top pic. Next year on this busy corner we will have views above a common and invading, like a noxious weed, 24/7 fast food outlet! Our quiet innerwest suburb will never be the same. Depressing that yet again $-making wins over community needs (7000 people signed against this development).

Sea Shepherd

A good story for Christmas.... Sea Shepherd :: Sea Shepherd Intercepts the Japanese Whaling Fleet with Drones

this is coming after this weeks sad news about the loss of a great man and world leader, the former czech president Vaclav Havel - who led the peaceful 1989 Velvet Revolution. RIP

playful conclusions

My good friend Gail popped round to the gallery for some playtime.

A walk along the Hawthorne Canal end of the GreenWay is a good way for time out from city life for me. This Sunday there is an open day at Art Est Gallery and Art School 2-5pm found through the mozaic tunnel at Lords Rd.

afterwards

"Well, what happens now to all the work" you may ask....  The current plan is all pieces will be stored for a while and then allowed out at the next GreenWay Festival or similar event. Meanwhile if there is an invitation to visit outside the area where works can be seen again I will be happy to install it and the project can continue to grow.

they all come tumbling down

 

Thank you to the lovely people at the Paper Plane Gallery for your generous time and support.

clustering connections before closing

there are so many pieces that its easy to see new layers and arrangements that respond or speak to one another.. smaller stories of interest within a bigger picture

colour and shape

   

                                

more hits 2011

yo - it's gangsta bat and double rocket jets

more pink along the green

here are exquisitely articulated a part 1 and 2 ...as double-sided spinning swingtags are the preferred way!

 

It's wonderful to see the range of freedom expressed in our works when we let go notions of perfection and simply enjoy the process of making. And all ranges of skill are represented from the littlest reaching their first year to someone in their 6th decade. Elements of the GreenWay or sheer play are hanging and conversing with one another. 


Hey Sue, I like yours and mine meeting here.