There’s not a great deal more satisfying than strolling around with a camera and shooting up the neighbourhood.  I’ve recently, in fact for a long time, found the work of many photographers inspiring. Simon Cowling for his precise graphic images and Brett Leigh Dicks for his style and projects which involve exploring anything from deserted prisons to atomic test sites and more recently lunch bars. My preference is for pictures which are complex, where colours, textures and graphic content attempt to make a simple image but don’t quite get there. I like to disobey the conventional rules and do aim … Continue reading Exploring the ‘hood, Bali style

In troubled times it’s comforting to think there may be a simple solution – and for one evening in Perth’s Forrest Place, there was. In a city where suffering had descended, a giant spider – Aranea “a kind and compassionate creature of the night” built a web capable of catching and collecting all the woes of the people, the “fear, grief, anxiety, doubt, stress, anger, loss, sadness … all the darkness we seek to let go”. Her web was then set ablaze after a ritual of fire-twirling dance, relieving burdens and lightening hearts. Cor Novis The Feast – a combination … Continue reading Aranea’s Blaze

Whose idea was it to have the brave and the foolhardy leap off Dyoondalup Point Walter jetty into the Swan River in the dark of night three weeks into winter? I’d like to give them a hug. It’s difficult for mums and teenage sons to find mutual interests so when I told my boys Rio and Hunter about the swim and Rio immediately wanted to join in I didn’t think twice about committing – at least until we were shivering on the jetty in our bathers, flanked by an encouraging crowd of Antarctic-style explorers dressed in heavy duty coats, parkas, … Continue reading One, Two, Three … GO!