Towards the end of September the Swell Sculpture Festival was held at the Gold Coast at Currumbin Beach. Spread along the beach and foreshore promanade were several stunning sculptures in a free to the public display. Sculptures ranged from the large to the small and many made from recycled objects. The above sculpture was by local artist Jan Keldar. The stunning mix of steel, stainless steel ,bronze and ferro cement creating a large rendition of an ancient marine life form.
Not to be out done by the man made sculptures Mother Nature added her own display of a sculptured form in this stunning display of a pandanus tree.
Looking out to sea the beautiful sculpture, Mahalo , by Jacqueline Campbell, asks us to celebrate life and live in peace and harmony with the earth, sea and sky.
From a distance this sculpture shone in the bright afternooon sun and beckoned you to examine it's structure. Upon walking closer I found the it to be made from recycled car tyres assembled and painted to resemble an asian pagoda. Local artist Niels Van Amsterdam the creator.
My favourite photo from the ones I took. Dancing in the Bouquet by Carlos Sanchez was stunning. After wandering in and around the sculpture the sun glistening from the edge of one of the large acrylic petals caught my attention. The resultant photo above.
A few weekends before the Swell festival I attended a Memoranza weekend for scrapbooking It was during the tea breaks at the back of the hall I spotted this image and the wonderful play of light and shadows.
Through the fence surrounding the hall , a lone branch of Bouganvillia spreads it ways through the palings seeking the light on the other side.

A Visual Diary Scrapbooked

I have decided to create a proper scrapbook of my ideas which I have been using for the Friendship books. The first page is about me, the things I do and question about the things I like, or, the 'who am I'. I've given myself 'wings' because I have to 'fly' among the activities I get myself embroiled in. The photo of me is one Jean-Pierre ,my partner, took of me at Victor Harbor in South Australia.
The next two pages are a double spread. I have created small fold out pieces with a photo on each fold out. These eight fold outs are the most important things in my life, family, friends, quilting, scrapbooking, photography, cooking, writing, and belly dancing.

On the inside of each fold out is a written piece briefly describing why each activity is important. I intend this scrapbook to be a visual diary exploring the things which make me tick, my thoughts, the places I enjoy , stuff I do with friends and family and the general humdrum day to day stuff we all know is boring to everyone else but important to ourselves and our famliy history.

Friendship Book: The Dreaming 2006

I finally managed to get a page done for my friendship book about the Dreaming. I decided to make it a double page spread with the pages folding out from the middle to reveal the story in the middle. I found some scrapbooking card at the local newsagent with the aboriginal colours and set about designing the front piece.I wanted the design to flow like a landscape. I ended up laying the three pieces of paper together and cut the design through the three pages then reassembled the pieces I wanted. It was then time to sit and paint the two pages before gluing them into the book.
I went through my pictures trying to select which ones I wanted to include in the layout. With so many to choose from, around 400! it was no easy task. In the end I settled on eight images which I felt conveyed the overall feeling of the Dreaming.
The highlights of the weekend for me where;
the atmosphere even with the inclement weather in the first few days,
The wonderful Snuff Puppets at the Dancestry site,
Gorgeous sculptures by a New Zealand artist. Carved out of campher laurel these statues were stunning,
And who could forget The Bigotbri CWA Ladies, their act extremely funny.

The crowds weren't large compared to the anuual Woodford Folk Festival so moving around was easy and the warmth from large fires in huge tins dotted around the site a favourite with all.The Message Stick truck was a delight as well with its painted decoration. Everybody enjoyed the Closing Ceremony, a wonderful mixture of dance and song.

If you have the chance and have nothing to do over the long weekend in June I'd suggest a visit to The Dreaming for a great dose of music and culture.

Time:Friendship Book

Time, do we ever have enough of it? I am always wanitng more time. More to do the things I like doing but I can also waste a lot of it! I decided to explore what I do with time as an entry in my friendship book exchange. The following pages are the result. I created a fold out section in which to write about what I did with my time.The front image is my sewing machine and in the background my scrapbooking work space. I learnt to sew at an early age and my sewing machine has always been set up ready to use. It is a place I love to spend time, particulary making quilts. My creative place tends to be a bit of a mess, sigh, and I often think , if I had more time perhaps I could keep it tidy.My problem is I tend to be creating several things at once, sewing, scrapbooking, or photographying.
The fold out flap, when fully pulled, out reveals one of my recent photographs, a quiet image of autumn leaves , and my work bench with my design board covered in various pieces and the clutter of several projects over my working space.
Time. I can never have enough of it and with all the things I love to do, time will never be boring.

The Dreaming 2006

The Dancestry Circle provided heaps of entertainment in the way of dance performances from dance groups around Australia, Mornington Island, Solomon Island and Jamaica. One of the highlights for me was to see the Snuff Puppets. These oversized human puppets delighted children and adults alike. The tale of the Nyet Nyet's , large woman figures, had every one intrigued. The Snuff puppets explore the stories of bunyips and like creatures from all over the country.

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The Closing Ceremony:

The final event of the Dreaming was the Closing Ceremony. The stage set across the other side of a small lake in the center of the site. The sloping bank giving everyone a perfect view. The light levels were low and the dancers too far away to make flash a viable options. With my camera loaded with 400 Asa film , 300mm zoom lens, and tripod set up I began taking pictures wondering how they would turn out with the long exposures times. I was happy with the results when my films were returned from being developed.I felt the movement of the dancers during the long exposure added to the sense of mystery of the dance performances.

Towards the end of the ceremony they lit several flares.The bright orange flames provided extra light but the film picked up the light as a bright red hue and there was a loss of detail in the images. I scanned a negative and decided to see how it would look with the colour removed. The resultant black and white image revealed lots more detail than could be seen in the coloured images. I scanned the rest of the closing ceremony images and ended up with some useful pictures.

The Dreaming June 2006

Grass sculptured cocoon, with sculptured butterflies attached, hanging in one of the trees on site.


Rain puddles creating patterns on the roadway and damp autumn leaves.

Over the Queens Birthday weekend my partner, Jean-Pierre, and I attended The Dreaming, an indigenous festival, at the Woodford Folk Festival site. Over the three days we were there we heard some great music, watched some wonderful films and contemporary dance, listened to great comedy and saw some beautiful indigenous artworks. The first two days were cloudy with intermittent showers but it did not stop anyones enthusiasm for the festival. The damp weather provided me with delightful photo opportunites, the rain intensifying the colours of the surrounding vegetation. Yothu Yindi played and were as inspiring as they were 20 years ago when they were at the height of their fame. Jean-Pierre and I had a wonderful time and this festival is definitly something we will try and attend next year.

Storm Clouds

On Sunday afternoon a brief storm passed through my area. The cloud above was a swirling mass of various shades of grey. It was stunning to watch. I ran around outside taking photographs, the thunder rumbled and lightning flashed across the sky. To the south of the house rain was falling in dark grey, solid sheets I expected the heavens to open at any moment and pour rain down on my head. As the storm passed over the roof of the house a brief shower fell but not enough to add anything substantial to my rain water tank. My partner was at Woodford , north of Brisbane, he texted me and said they had hail fall and towards the coast at Ormeau , were a girlfriend lives, they also had some hail.