In under 2 weeks’ time, I will be celebrating quite a niche anniversary: I will have had my favourite phone app around for 10 years already. This is causing additional mental computational problems to the usual ones to do with the calendar year ending. What’s the app? It’s called Pocket. Many of you might be using it already, but it’s a great way to save articles (as in, the non-academic ones) you come across online for offline reading later. I think I’ve mentioned it quite a few times in this blog already, but longform journalism is probably my preferred reading genre. And then short stories. I don’t have enough attention span for an entire book. In fact, I’ve recently realised that I haven’t even finished a book of short stories that I started in 2020 (never fear, I have read individual stories within the book from start to finish). Pocket has been there with me from the remote mountainous parts of Azerbaijan to the middle of Lake Titicaca. It’s entertained me on many a long-haul flight when I’ve exhausted all the minimally-suspenseful movie options (again, you’ve probably read elsewhere in this blog that I even get scared by children’s movies). Of course, on a more mundane level, Pocket also comes with me on my little adventures checking out the sights and events of Sydney. I thought that I’d tell you about some outdoor art this month.

Some of the pieces I want to talk about are more permanent. I took these photos of Redfern street art over a period of about 2 years, and they probably represent a tiny fraction of all the murals that exist in this part of town. Redfern (Gadigal land) is probably familiar with most people who had ever set foot in Sydney (unless you really only came to see the Opera House). I will not do its various subcultures justice in this blog post as somebody who visits only sometimes on a weekend. Nor its fascinating history of Indigenous activism. I don’t feel those stories are mine to tell. I’ll leave you with a visual teaser of a few landmarks you might want to check out for yourself. The only thing I’ll add is an apology for forcing upon you not one, but two likenesses of a particular former Prime Minister, painted in the act of marrying himself. If you didn’t know the story behind the mural, you can probably still guess that it is some kind of political statement about same sex marriage. I am torn between an admiring appreciation for brilliant political expression and never wanting to see that particular face again (my greatest hesitation about Australia becoming a republic is potentially seeing all those billboard smirks transferred to our coins and banknotes, otherwise I am all for it), let alone in duplicate. 

The more transient art featured in this post are from the Head On Photo Festival that closed earlier this month. There were several exhibitions around town. Unfortunately I didn’t get to see the ones at Bondi Beach. My availabilities and the weather just didn’t quite line up. But very fortunately, I did manage to get to the Paddington Reservoir Gardens (Gadigal land). For such a unique inner city spot, I was surprised that it wasn’t better known. I only found out about it when the word “subterranean” caught my eye. Maybe I am trying to project my ignorance onto the rest of the city, but please just indulge me with the urge to tell everyone about my new discovery. The “reservoir” bit is obviously long gone, actually decommissioned in 1899. But it wasn’t until the roof collapsed on the shell that was left behind needed to be repurposed. In the end, they kind of went, “Who needs a roof here anyway?” and we ended up with this lush and slightly otherworldly open green public space below street level.

Finally, here’s a mural I happened to walk past in Tallawoladah (also known as The Rocks, Gadigal land) created by Jason Wing, an Aboriginal artist of the Biripi Nation. It is titled Pemulwuy – “Butu Wargun”. The protagonist, Pemulwuy (Bidjigal Nation), is as many of you would know, one of the great Aboriginal leaders in the immediate post-colonisation period, one of the fearless central figures in organised resistance. Here he’s pictured as a crow, because legend has it that when he was imprisoned by the British, he escaped by turning into a crow and flying out of his jail cell. And I’ll leave this story here because I promised myself that I wouldn’t end my blogging for the year on a negative note. The defiant final sentence for 2023 is that his descendants are still here.