Eastern Suburbs Art Group

Despite an incipient panic attack I made it out to Parramatta last night for WestWords a poetry reading and read out two poems including one about my aunt who died. The event was in honour of a poet who had passed away so I tried to be topical. The trip was timely for another reason (see photo below) as I’d been contacted on Facebook Marketplace about a photo I had in my garage by Philip Plisson. It’s a striking image and the buyer lives out in the north-west so Parramatta was handy for both of us to meet and to do the transaction. I parked in Hunter St and met him so he could put it in his car. Willem Tibben is the name of the man who died and after the evening of readings I feel like I know him a little better. Regrettably I forgot in my haste to leave home to bring a bag with paintings I’d done to show the organisers and attendees. It was an interesting evening and I got home about 10pm or thereabouts so in time to watch a little bit of some idiotic crime drama, it was American and ...

I jumped in the car to go to Petersham Bowlo for a poets reading on Thursday evening after hanging the living room wall with different works (see photo below). At the bowling club there was a good turnout of regulars as well as some visitors, I showed them the ‘CAPitalism’ series as well as the ‘Shipwreck’ series which I’d brought along in my bag. When it was my turn to read I read out ‘Mourning raiments for J* H*’ a sonnet about a mother who’s son had killed himself. The choice was apposite as the group were remembering a man who was a regular and who had died in hospital. One man at the event was giving away ‘Trad & Now’ magazine copies I took mine home and had a look at it the next day it’s all about folk music and that scene but he said they also take political poetry, so I emailed them. No reply by 18 Feb possibly my email had gone to the spam folder in their client software.

On Wed I drove out to Windsor to the Hawkesbury Regional Gallery for a curator’s talk about enormous watercolours Victorian artist Mark Dober made on a residency in New South Wales. I felt a bit out of place due to my yellow shoes and black T-shirt, but everything went according to plan and I learned a good deal about Mark’s residency and the history of these fantastic works. I’ve seen them on Facebook before but in real life they’re quite different, great big vistas you almost fall into. Mark makes them in the field but I went away wanting more information on his process because it seems almost impossible to take so many sheets of paper out into the countryside and you imagine that it must take many days in the same spot to complete all of them. In short this is a wonderful show. I guess that most collectors would struggle to find a space big enough to accommodate one of these artworks, but perhaps the artist also makes smaller ones for commercial sale. I look forward to finding out m...

Last Saturday I went to a book launch at The Shop Gallery in Glebe for Flying Islands Press who have a number of new poetry books out and available to buy. Virginia went along too and got a seat so I contented myself with the pavement for most of the afternoon.  The above photo is what I saw for a while until a break took me outside where I bought the books with a handy credit card. I kept the meter fed so that there was no parking ticket and later sat down on a chair near the kerb so I could watch in comfort. Met up with Devina (who hastily snapped the following photo of me resplendent in summer outfit of T-shirt and board shorts) and other people as well including authors I have met over the years.  It was a nice event though a little long, Virginia and I arrived at 5pm and left at 8pm when the show was still on.  A good afternoon.

Simon and I took a bus/train combo to get to Kings Cross then walked down the hill. Arrived at Arthouse Gallery the room was already full at 10 past 6, we took in the pictures by James Ettelson, whose show we’d come to see but there was also a collection of photos by Kate Ballis.  The above photo is me in front of one of Ettelson’s larger works, he also had prints available for sale. Ballis’ photos are quite large too and in mainly three colours, somehow she’d contrived a camera that turns vegetation a sort of rusty red. To vary the scene we traipsed down to Sally Dan-Cuthbert’s gallery and took in a range of artists’ works, including these by Rive Roshan which are quite striking in their elegant simplicity. I also appreciated Tammy Kanat’s embroideries.