Hello, and welcome to Art Club. This concept has been inspired by the timeless genius of Jazz Club.

Great.

Each day, I will be adding a new piece to this blog. Now, whether there are any other fans of the visual arts out in blogger land, we are just going to have to find out.

Crazy!

To kick things off, something from the local collection - Australia even. Sidney Nolan, the first Australian artist to break through the million dollar mark for a piece of his work.



Sidney Nolan, Ned Kelly 1946 - National Gallery of Australia

This is part of probably his most famous series of work, following the last days of Ned Kelly, a Victorian outlaw who has been the centre of a seemingly frenzied myth-making industry ever since his 1880 execution in Melbourne. Nolan's grandfather himself was part of the police gang sent into the countryside to track Kelly down.

The black armour with the bleak sunburnt country behind has almost made this painting an iconic piece of Australiana. So much so, that I was more than pleasantly surprised at the depth and range of the rest of Nolan's retrospective.

Wunderbar.

Welcome To Two Thou Eight

Yes, it has been a while, hasn't it? 2007 was basically my family's annus horribulus, so by the end of it, raking over the coals of two dead grandparents and all the uncertainty of where will we live next week - well, it did feel a game show at some points, hmm. Just needed to take a bit of a break I guess.

So the big news is that the parents have moved, to Woop Woop 90210 (aka halfway to the Sunshine Coast), and because I wouldn't move with them - eight kays away from public transport, and I don't want to have to rely on the taxi service - I had even less time than them to find a rental place. Nundah to be precise, lots of rental places around here, and I must have looked at at least fifty of them online if not in real lol. By myself, which is a positive, with broadband (so am listening to Vancouver radio station at the moment, mmm the accents). Of course, setting the household up basically took all my savings, and the number of arguments with the close friends, well, let's just accentuate the positive :)

Although the New Year has started off delicately in another direction, had a seizure, the first in fourteen months, last weekend. Was all by myself at home as well, until someone decided to put a phone call in and start a general conversation. I was at that babbling stage, and then my parents were on the case and came and picked me up. Feeling uber crappy at work this week, had one day off sick, two doc appointments, one set of blood tests, which are epilim is low, liver count is high, play with the dosage and have more tests in two weeks. Uber crappy...

One two bedroom flat (one bedroom acting as a study) is four weeks bond, two weeks rent in advance, three ute tray loads of furniture from home, one x LCD TV, one x washing machine, one x fridge, one x microwave, one x computer, and endless trips to the supermarket. LOL I have fallen in love with Woolworths.

Work is same old same old. Staff are good, but work is less than good. Hope to have the next social drinks this coming Friday, fingers crossed more than three people will turn up... off to the parents for dinner tonight.

Later taters
Paul

Placeholder Mid Nov

Yeah, I know, I am pathetic with attention here. Just so many other entertaining sites around, damn you to heck, Facebook LOL.

First named cyclone of the Queensland season is Goober - oops, I mean Guba, 400 kays east of Cape York at the moment. While the south east of the state is almost into Level Six restrictions, hmmph. They had on the news tonight some random prediction that there would be flooding in January, and they were reporting it as if this would be a good thing. Get your insurance in now, low lying flatlanders :)

And just as useless information number five hundred and twenty three, my top ten fave bands, as registered on the statistics of when I play music randomly are as in descending order - Radiohead, REM, Red Hot Chili Peppers, Crowded House, Green Day, Bee Gees, Billy Joel, Neil Diamond, U2 and Christina Aguilera.

Return Serve

I'm not sure whether I can actually be coherent in this post or not, but may rather do bullet points or something, was stressed last week and am down, lurking close to depression, this week.

Had my monthly review at work last week - breezed through it, and I got a 'team member of the month' award this week, but one bit of the conversation with the boss stuck with me, and I wanted to remember it to put down on 'paper' here.

I said that I thought I was well enough liked in the team - boss said, don't think it, know it, and it is more than just liking, that my colleagues respect me. As if respect is important I was saying to myself - hell, I don't do it for myself, so why should others?

It is funny, I think I do a good enough job in the workplace because unlike some others around the place I can easily make the hard decisions and take responsibility for my actions, whereas others just wishy wash their way into doing not much of anything. Whereas my private life has very few hard decisions made, responsibility taken and the rest.

Running away from the hard issues and decisions in my personal life works well enough for me - or perhaps not.

Sometimes I wonder if I am manic depressive, sometimes it seems as if my moods can turn on a pin. Example - fab weekend just gone, Monday morning in the office and it all turns to shit.

Or perhaps I sabotage my own happiness - the 'we're not worthy' syndrome. Example, sending my work visa application when in Canada to the wrong consulate - Boston instead of Buffalo, or whatever it was. It just extended the timeframe before I could earn money, be semi independent and the rest by just a few more weeks, but those few weeks were the death knell of the relationship. Whether I was actually happy at the time is another question.

As well as currently, making decisions on the direction in life over the next X number of years, I am sure if I made a decision and stuck with it I would be happy, but no, I have to drag it out over the various coals for as extended a time as possible.

Maybe I have a pathological desire to be liked, and the greatest fear is to be rejected. Especially if that rejection came when showing weakness or vulnerability. Hence the confident, sometimes brash, sometimes obnoxious exterior I show in the wider world.

Does the word depression automatically make one a headcase nutjob?

Am very much in Retreat From The World mode right the last couple of days.

May write despatches, or I might see you on the other side...

Multicultural Festival 07

I enjoyed myself heaps at last year's one, so decided to go again - even though I had to get up at about 7.30am on a Sunday morning, I was bouncing out the door in excitement about an hour later. Kinda lucky there wasn't any rugby to watch - small mercies, for the next four bloody years.

Got to Roma Street Parklands, quickly grazed past the Citizenship Ceremony - yawn, boring - and found myself listening to the first world music (flute, guitar and mandolin I think) while eating a Bolivian 'papa' - sweet potato and mince in a pastry of some type. I think a smile was already on my face - and unlike last year, I had already plastered sunscreen on myself.

Then up to the Amphitheatre for the Ethiopian dance troupe - kids aged from about seven to seventeen, oh, I wish I could describe the sounds from yesterday. Ethiopia was nice, but it wasn't exactly mindblowingly good, if you know what I mean.

Then over to Act Two, arriving a bit early, so had the Indian sitar gourd thing - a morning raga, I am reading from the programme, though what that is I'm not exactly sure. Had the drum and strings thing going anyways. Round Two of Ethnic Food Of The Day was provided by Vietnam, rice paper rolls, which were very yum.

Aboriginal dancers up next, and they were very good, didgeridoo, clacking sticks, dancing writhing about in front of me - front row seat and the dust was being kicked up good. Got a couple of really good photos from that.

Then, via a Spanish fudge filled churro, it was to Bolivia, and the umm high set costumes on the women and the full wool for the guys. I am sure it was about five degrees warmer last year for the Fest, so it was nice that the Bolivians would have been a bit cooler this year. And it felt like it was a longer set last year, but maybe it was just the feeling of Greatest Multiculture Fest 06 Rewind about seeing Bolivia two years in a row. Or something.

Up the hill again to Mongolia, and OMG wow, horsehead fiddle and harmonic singing, and it was definitely one of the finds of the day. Transported to the icy wastes of a Mongolian winter, hard thing to do in the subtropics, and the instrument itself was beautiful. Hung around for ten minutes afterwards just to get a picture of the square fiddle, with the horse's head. I missed the Sierra Leoneans on another of the stages, but a small price to pay. Good music as well.

After filling my face with Russian potato pie, YUM, sat down and took in five minutes of Irish music. But then got sick of it very quickly and lined up for spicy German sausage, with sauerkraut even - hey, it was around midday and lunchtime, so it was feed your face time. First major queues of the day, and although it was cooler than last year, it was still frustrating waiting behind people - especially the guy that said 'Guten Tag, I'll have one of those - Auf Wiedersehen'. Umm, I think they will understand English, dickhead.

Up again to the Upper Parklands, this time to see Rwandan dance and drums. And boy, did those African drums get going. Not meaning to sound umm un-multicultural, if that is a word, but massively good beat that wouldn't be out of place in a King Kong or Heart of Darkness adaptation. And what was with the drumstick twirling around the neck thing - I have to say that 1994 was a bit on my mind with the Rwandans. But damned good drumming.

Then back down to the main stage, for the Kurds - I had forgotten how bored I was with them last year. Of course, I was red as a beet at that stage of the day last year, and after a second application of sunscreen, I was still good to go - didn't get burnt all day. The Kurdish dancing still wasn't up to much chop though. If you had a better national dance, maybe you would have had your own country by now :)

And then an unscheduled treat - the Congolese boys were running late, and I didn't have them penned into my schedule, but OMG, these kids can't have been much older than eighteen, but for about twenty minutes straight they danced with their 'hips'. Should have had parental advisory labels on their act, cos it was damned HOT. And yes, saying that as a straight guy. Was bloody brilliant, actually.

And then followed up with the Spanish dancers - girl ones, that is, not quite flamenco, or maybe it was. The group had been formed for Expo 88 and had danced for the King of Spain (sorry, but that does sound a bit cliche, you think?) all the way back then. Very good dancing, a little less sexyback than the Congolese boys though.

Then the set piece of the Carnival Procession, this year brought to you by the letters G, Y, P, S and Y. Less a Rio Carnivale as it was last year, more a dirty hippy gypsy big band thing, although with the Bolivians, Colombians and a couple of belly dancers bringing up the rear.

And then as the finale of my day - I well and truly maxed out my camera's memory card, and the battery itself was starting to die - I got about twenty shots in of the Colombian Carnivale thing. Some good shots towards the end of the battery life, and I had it on bloody auto - the rest of the day I was pretending that I knew better than a microchip and was taking some crap shots, I should have left it on auto for the duration. Ah well next year.

Ended the day wandering around the food tents - the Abyssinians had run out of their curry, the Swiss still had copious amounts of their chocolate fondue, with fruit to dip in it (as the guy said, last year they tried the traditional cheese one, but it's a hard sell this time of year in Brisbane, chocolate is easier), and I had a meat and pepper skewer of doubtful provenance from the Rwandans. Hmm, that sounded bad didn't it - I think it was beef...

Left Roma Street at about 3.30 and just made the right train home without waiting another half hour. Had a bit of a tan on my face, but the nose, neck and arms were well looked after - sunscreen, whoda thunk it would be that useful lol?

Fab day, two years out of two, am already counting down to next year. Something truly GOOD the Queensland government sponsors. I don't have that many days where I just live in the here and now, and Multicultural Fest brings that out in me, big time.

Paul

Grief, or lack thereof...

My poor, neglected blog, under all the virtual tumbleweeds. Resuscitation is required.

My grandmother died on Sunday morning - this one being my dad's mother. Kind of unexpected, heard on Friday that she was too ill and frail for them to even attempt surgery, with a timeframe of up to 72 hours - but she had been sick on and off for the past several months. Into and out of hospital probably half a dozen times recently.

I just feel empty about the whole process. It wasn't that she was a particularly bad grandmother, just one of those type of people that it can be hard to have a conversation with (is that bad of me to say about a dead family member?), and that I wasn't particularly close to.

Not particularly close to all of that side of the family really - Rotorua is the Centre Of The Universe and if you move away well, you are downshifting big time and sometimes it feels a bit unworthy of attention. With Dad moving to be with Mum in Wellington over thirty five years ago, and staying away, well, our spiral of the family has always felt on the outer.

I had only visited or seen her twice in the last eight years - once all the way back in 2000, when I travelled with the parents to visit Rotorua, the other about eighteen months ago (surely not that long, time sure does fly) when she and a couple of Dad's siblings came for a visit here. Not the best of times all around, that trip. And that will be the last time I will have seen her.

Of course, compare that to the closeness I have with Mum's side of the family. Even when I was still at school, we visited Mum's parents almost weekly - Dad and Grandad going off to the pub for a couple of hours, while us kids watched videos - hey, it was the 80s and early 90s - and the women chatting. No, that wasn't meant to sound like it was from the 1960s or anything, but it is a very calming, 'finding my centre' kind of memory in my life - if anyone knows what I mean.

And even when I was living away from home by myself, when in Wellington I used to visit Mum's parents once every two or three weeks, and when we were in different cities and countries, I did my best to see them at least once a year.

And then, when Grandad died in April, the mourning kicked in big time. I am soooo glad I went to see them in February - one of the photos I took then got put on the funeral pamphlet. Hey, it's my job in my family to be the photographer - and I like to think I am quite good at it. So, I went to the funeral in Tauranga, got up and spoke at the service, cried heaps.

But with Nana, that is not happening as much. And it is not just because I am so far away from New Zealand - with Grandad, I was gutted well before reaching Auckland Airport. And it is kind of giving me the guilts as well - that I am not mourning equally, that I am not mourning as I should, that when I think about the whole situation, I just have an empty hole inside, basically devoid of any emotion, positive or negative.

Guilty that I wasn't close to her or Dad's side of the family. Guilty about not going to the funeral, which was today - although it would have been expensive, I would have just gotten underfoot, and it probably wouldn't have been appreciated. The parents have gone, but they were not looking forward to the inevitable family tensions and gossip said behind backs etcetera. Guilty that I forgot to send flowers - although that probably wouldn't have been fully appreciated either - Dad's father died in 1990, so it is only the siblings left.

I thought that when I started writing this, some sort of emotion would flare into life, but it is strange, I am feeling number and number about it all. And no, not in a fainting or seizure way.

In one of those strange, circle of life twists, my second niece got born on Friday night. 9 lb 10 oz, almost two feet long, with a full head of hair already. Apparently that is a big baby, from what I have been told.

My blog is feeling like the cobblestones have been swept at least. Albeit perhaps swept lazily, but it is a start...

On The Move Again

Hmm, my parents have decided to put in an offer on another house and wanting to sell this one. They decided this on the weekend that I was away in Tasmania, and the first I heard of it was when I rang to check whether my brother's girlfriend had had her baby yet, and was told that there was a real estate agent meeting going on.

And they had moved my queen sized bed out of my room, and replaced it with a single, to make the room look bigger. I haven't slept on a single in at least a decade, grrr - was not impressed. And I think it is finally the push I needed to move out - seriously thinking about it, whether in Brisbane or interstate is the only question at the moment...

And yes, I have been neglecting my blog, so many other distracting websites out there...