Rugby video

Here's a video of the Melbourne Storm vs. Brisbane from the rugby game we went to a few weeks ago...I just got the uploading to work. It's a bit shaky but gives you the idea.

Outdoor Art-Docklands Area

Most of these were taken in the Docklands, a newer part of Melbourne that reminds us of the Pearl district in Portland. Except it's built along the waterfront, and you can watch sailboats, speedboats, and ships. (And there's no Powells Bookstore). There are great outdoor art sculptures here as well as high-end condos, restaurants, and shops. Lots of rich-looking people walking around in their designer clothes. It was a nice, sunny day and we had fun walking around the area. The top photo is a funky bridge, and the red balloon is just something I spotted near a picnic area where a group was having a party-- it made me smile.

Scenes from Southbank

Walking through Southbank, on the way to the Docklands last Sunday, we saw a colorful march for detainee rights, a poster advertising GB's upcoming appearance in Sydney (can you tell how people feel about him?), a seemingly concrete-covered busker, and a set of outdoor sculptures.

Thank You!

South Melbourne beach
Beach treasures
Beach view

My new hat!

Just a reminder that Mark and I will be moving outta our digs here in Melbourne by Saturday, September 8, so any mail you want to send should probably head our way by this Thursday. Usually things take 5-7 days to get here- sometimes longer. It seems like just yesterday when I was posting our address and pleading you all to send us mail. A huge thank-you and virtual kiss to everyone who has sent us cards, letters, etc.! It has really helped with being so far away from our friends and family. And, I was so excited to get this handmade hat in the mail today from our dear friend, Kari! She is a fabulous artist and very crafty. (Bet you didn't think men's briefs would look so good on my head!). You can't tell from the photos, but the top has a little plastic green alien on top! I love it!! I'll be the most popular girl on the beach...

Travel Feature

View from hotel, Oceanside
Flowers and ShorelineBreathtaking Perspective
Waves, Rocks and Birds
Beach Sunset

Jeff, Danny, me, Mom
Bride and Groom

My dad sent me an email last week about the Wichita Eagle (newspaper in Wichita, KS) needing Oregon coast travel stories. We both decided to submit one. They had to be 200 words or less, which was challenging. It was a fun experience, though, thinking about how to capture my admiration for the coast in as few words as possible while including the wedding story. We also submitted some photos (see above for photos, all taken by my dad). None of those got published, but both stories did! They're in the "Travel" section of Sunday's paper, or you can read them here. Ps: they didn't do much editing but it bugs me that they changed my wording from "the ocean and I were strangers" to "I and the ocean..." It just doesn't seem to read quite the same.

Beautiful Day

The Espy

Looking up at Town Hall
Front view- Town Hall

South Melbourne Town Hall

Looking away from beach area
Palm trees at St.Kilda beach

View from Beach
St.Kilda beach

Yesterday was beautiful; we spent a few hours in the sunshine at the St. Kilda Beach, enjoying 70 degree weather....a prelude to our upcoming Queensland trip. It was so nice to just lay in the sand, read, and watch the cute dogs and children frolicking near the waves. We also stopped by Hotel Esplanade, aka: the Espy, a well-known bar/music venue, and had a snack and tasty beverage. As we were walking home, we spotted a majestic building in a South Melbourne neighborhood and found it was a town hall built in 1880, in an area formerly known as Emerald Hill. Apparently, the hill where the hall now stands used to be a green island with swamp-land around it- that's why it acquired the name Emerald Hill. Mark also read on a sign that the building had formerly been the South Melbourne library.

Jewelry & Melbourne Art

Painting by Nicole Rose-"Melbourne"
Photo by Warren Lansley-"The Link, Melbourne"

Here are three more recent creations of mine...the double-stranded necklace is a new attempt...I got the idea from looking at some jewelry at the local Sunday Arts Market, very similar to Portland's Saturday Market. We purchased a few pieces of art to take home from local Melbourne artists on Sunday (see above). It's really great to be able to talk with the artists themselves, and buy it directly from them. It will be a cool reminder of our time here.

Graffiti Art

Ever seen graffiti on a wall or billboard, and thought 'there's more to that than vandalism?' I'd never consider graffiti as art in the past, but that began shifting with my first trip to San Francisco in 1997-98, my senior year in college, seeing the ocean and the graffiti art portraits lining the beach. I took photos of the colorful images- I still have the one of the Bob Marley tribute mural I snapped while leaving the city in my friend Laurie's pickup (we were in S.F. for a mutual friend's wedding and did a quick road trip from Lawrence, KS). Last summer, while in Amsterdam with a group of other UW students doing research, I was again fascinated by the idea of graffiti as art when one of the students researched Dutch hip-hop and graffiti artists (particularly Laser 3.14 in Amsterdam), interviewing them about their work and photographing graffiti among the canals and abandoned apartment buildings and sidestreets of central Amsterdam. After moving to Oz, I found that Melbourne has an active graffiti art community. I watched a documentary about it the other day, a discovery at the library that intrigued me. It makes a distinction between mere 'tagging' (signing one's identifying signature on public spaces just to cause damage) and graffiti as art. In this film, graffiti is also called 'street art', 'pictures on a wall', 'public art', and 'reclaiming space'. It was described as "livening up the place", "visually stimulating" and "creating a dialogue". Many of the artists use it to express their opinions about local politics or social issues, and graffiti on a large billboard or other advertising space is seen as an expression against redevelopment, and our advertisement-saturated, commercially influenced society. A wide array of public art is on display around Melbourne and graffiti is both alive and well--like it or not. There is even an outdoor gallery here in Hosier Lane, called CityLights, and an indoor, independent gallery in the same area called 'Until Never' featuring unrespresented, street, political, experimental and conceptual artwork. The Melbourne City Council has debated what to do, as $200,000/year is spent cleaning graffiti; the conversation continues as different approaches are attempted in various communities around Victoria. The MCC distinguishes between types of graffiti- tagging, stencilling, protest slogans, and graffiti art (which this article defines as "complex illustrations in graffiti style painted on large surfaces"). Perhaps the best thing, in my opinion, is that it sparks the conversation among community members, families, policymakers, and artists--conversations about "what is art?" and "how do we decide which art gets public space and attention in our community?" It is a complex, worthwhile question. The first six photographs (from bottom) were taken in the Richmond neighborhood, and the others are from Hosier Lane in downtown Melbourne.