Journey Jottings

It’s always exciting to get invitations to art gallery exhibition openings and this week I got one for an exhibition of lino-prints by Anna Curtis at ‘Framed ~ The Darwin Gallery’ that runs from the 9th July to the end of the month.

If you are lucky enough to be in Darwin (enjoying the beautiful dry season weather) I can highly recommend dropping into the Gallery to view this new body of work, which is described as ‘a feast of images that will lift your spirit and feed your soul’

Can’t wait for the new images of this exhibition to be put up on Anna’s  website, which will no doubt happen after she has had time to come up to breath… i.e. after opening night!

In the mean time, here is the link to a blog post I wrote last year about Anna that shows a few images of her work ~

And here are a couple more!

Which for now will have to suffice!

‘Mangroves‘  vegetate the inter-tidal area between land and sea that gets flooded with the tides. The name Mangrove is therefore applied to any plant that is able to live in salt water whether a tree, a bush, a fern, grass or shrub.

Over 18% of the Australian coast line is vegetated with mangroves ~

This week, I was sent an invitation to a gallery exhibition opening in Port Hedland with this beautiful pastel image on canvas of mangroves, by artist Sharon Jack.

Pastel on canvas by artist Sharon Jack

The exhibition of her work is to run through July to the end of August, should you be lucky enough to be in Western Australia during this period ~

The islands in the Bay off Brisbane, where I’m based, are surrounded by some beautiful species of mangrove ~

More than anything, I love their arched root systems

And these that must be years old with amazing gnarled and weathered trunks

As the soils in these zones have little oxygen the root systems are  generally close to the surface, and do a great job of helping to prevent erosion

Journey Jottings:

Where/When/How ~ What did I See, Hear, Smell, Touch, Taste?

• Australia’s inter-tidal zone

• Arching roots
• Clicking of crabs disappearing down holes
• Un-oxygenated mud
• Shiny leaves, slippery mud
• Salt

Having just got back from the Trade Fair in Sydney I thought I’d post photos illustrating our booth when I got there – a bare black box – to when fully decked out with our red display stands, maps and the Journey Jottings banner flying over head…

However, in the process of taking a short-cut by importing and deleting off the camera all in one go, I managed to loose the lot

After commiserating over a delicious hot buttery crumpet with blackberry jam I set off on the rebound for a evening walk with camera in hand and was treated to the most beautiful bevy of toadstools all popping up as we head into autumn ~

Now lets be honest ~ What would you rather look at? A trade fair, or these wonderful creations of nature?

Sand still perched on the top of this one having freshly popped its head up!

Is this a puffball pushing its way up?

This one looked like an anemone

Another puffball?

This one looks like a natural sponge!

What an amazing variety and in such sandy soil

After months of the local banksia trees showing only their old scruffy looking seed pods ~

Scruffy Banksia Seed Pods

Today, after a lot of rain, I noticed a couple of  beautiful fresh lemon yellow flowers blooming  :)

Banksia Flowers

The genus Banksia is named after the botanist, Sir Joseph Banks who accompanied James Cook on the 1768-1771 voyage to Australia.

Joseph Banks

He collected samples from Botany Bay which were sketched and painted by Sydney Parkinson a botanical artist who was also on the expedition.

I’ve always held a soft spot for banksia seed pods; they remind me of both muppets faces, and the beaks of baby birds gapping open wide begging for more worms!

Banksias were ‘brought to life’ by May Gibbs in 1918 in her children’s books Tales of Snugglepot and Cuddlepie.

Sadly for me they are portrayed as the baddies of the tale ~ Banksia Men

Banksia Man by May Gibbs

Grass trees are found in a range of climates across Australia,  from WA to the NT and down to Tasmania.

I photographed the group of grass trees above on Stradbroke Island, east of Brisbane, Queensland, but I have equally enjoyed their presence near Perth in WA and in the hinterland to Byron Bay in northern NSW.

The 28 species of  Xanthorrhoea found in Australia grow painfully slow. At only a couple of centimeters a year, it can take 20 years for the trunk to start to appear under the grassy mop, so a a grass tree standing two metres could be 100 years old. Some live for as long as 600 years.

Grass Tree, previously known as a Blackboy

They have in the past been known as Blackboys, which was originally based on the aboriginal name for the tree ‘Balga’ that means black boy, but was then colloquially applied due to the tree’s silhouetted resemblance, when in flower, of an Aboriginal holding a spear. The spear like flower that protrudes out of the top of the grassy sprouting foliage can grow up to four metres tall and can just be seen in my photo above.

Aren’t they wonderful

I simply had to share these wonderful images by Linoprint artist Anna Curtis.

As Anna says…  “The unique beauty of the Australian native bush and all its elements is wondrous.”

“I like to capture the essence of flowers, fruits, leaves and trunks through close observation of their intricacy, patterns and colors. With the addition of bushfire, devastation and regeneration, the images culminate in a feast of color and movement.”

Anna specialises in the art of reduction linoprinting. It requires a single linoblock, which is progressively carved away between the printing of each colour to create these amazing multicolored images.

To watch this remarkable process appear before your eyes as each colour is applied in a time lapse sequence for the linoprint pictured below “Nature’s Garden – Bold Banksia”  click here

Anna’s work can be found in numerous galleries across Australia ~

For details go to her website: http://www.annacurtis.com.au

And if you’re lucky enough to be in Port Douglas, north Queensland on a Sunday morning, you’ll invariably find her in the market there

Watercolour from a walk in the Border Ranges, NSW

Volcanic rock, Bleeding Heart leaf, giant snail shell, eucalypt leaf and fallen Flame tree flowers are things that caught my magpie eye on this walk through the rainforest at Bar Mountain in the Border Ranges, NSW

Reflection of a moment

When you think of Australia which landscapes do you picture?

Rusty red sunburnt country… Aquamarine coral reefs… Pearly white beaches… or… Lush green rainforest?

With only 0.3% of the continent covered by rainforest it is not surprising that the first three landscapes listed generally steal the limelight. Yet the rainforests contain about half of all Australian plant families and a third of Australia’s mammal and bird species.

Stepping into the Australian rainforest feels like stepping back into the ancient world of Gondwanaland when, 140 million years ago, Australia was part of a large southern continent connected to Antarctica, South America, Africa and India.

Gondwanaland ~ Showing fossil connections

The vegetation found here is the most ancient in Australia with plant forms showing little change over the aeons of time from their fossilised ancestors and it is here one can see the magnificent Antarctic Beech trees.

Up until recently it was thought that these amazing huge dinosaurs of the forest were now only reproducing by copsing, or suckering, as they grow in circles encompassing the older remnant of a predecessor.

Their moss and lichen covered trunks, frequently adorned with birds-nest ferns and creepers rise atop exposed gnarled roots from which they have grown for hundreds of years.

Antarctic Beeches ~ Nothofagus Moorei

These ancient mammoth like sculptures can be found in the few remaining pockets of cool temperate rainforests, which thankfully are now World Heritage listed, and lie between Barrington Tops (200km north of Sydney) and the Lamington National Park just over the border into Queensland.

My favourite spot for time travelling back into their pre-historic kingdoms to view these awe-inspiring relics is in the Border Ranges National Park, which is on the NSW side of the Qld/NSW border