Mali in the City: celebrating 150 years of Melbourne Zoo

Mali is the first elephant born at Melbourne Zoo. To celerate 150 years of Melbourne Zoo, lifesize, fibreglass sculptures of the baby elephant Mali were painted by 50 different artists. The sculptures were then dotted around Melbourne's CBD for 6 weeks, and then displayed for another month at the zoo itself. More about it here.

I didn't see all of them up close but these guys did.

Here are my shots:

A Pattern of Orange-bellied Parrot
Vanessa Bong (sponsored by Queen Victoria Market)
at Queen Victoria Market in Melbourne



Ming Vase Elephant
by Brian Cheung (sponsored by ecoFuture)
at Queen Victoria Market

I was chatting with a lady who said she travelled about to see the sculptures and that this was the best one she had seen. I was very impressed by it myself. I didn't endeavour to see more because I suspected that I had seen what I would conclude was the best one too. It's hard to convey the tonal quality of this piece in a photo.




Detail of side facing wall:

Even more Spring blooms.

This time the blooms have been chosen not so much for their beauty - which is still there - but for their unusual structural qualities.

A rose reminiscent of a love heart:


Some rose buds:


Cephalopodlian Aquilegia buds (I think they look like squid, my housemate F thinks the greenish ones look like seamonster heads):



The same bud but a pretty shot:

Oh, holy corn cob.

Don't you hate it when you drop one of your husked corn cobs from Victoria Market
down the back of the bagging bench at Aldi,
and it plops into their Christmas window display,
lying among little bell shaped chocolates and cotton wool
like Jesus in the manger with straw, and the animals, kings and things,
and you can't reach it,
and you won't leave your stuff unattended
but you really want your corn cob back,
so you hope to catch the eye of the cleaner with his broom
then an attentive check out chick comes and asks what's wrong
and she gets the cleaner to help you out
using the handle of his broom to push the corn cob within reach?

Yeah me too...

Interesting car plates

I don't play with Lego as an adult but I can understand this one. Old school Lego is cool! I quite like SpongeBob SquarePants and it really suits this slightly boxy, yellow hatchback. I can not explain this one. Colour me bemused.

Street art: House, Fitzroy North

Fitzroy North near Alexander Parade ,October 2012 This house is covered in art, including the front fence!

Street art: crushed can, Melbourne CBD

Another cast concrete sculpture in the Melbourne CBD (near corner of Bourke and Elizabeth), possibly from the same artist as this burger and fries. I ran a few random words through Google Translator in both Chinese and Japanese to see if any characters resembling it came up.  The character is Chinese meaning 'dead'. If anyone of you can clarify/confirm I'd like to hear from you in the comments.

Nothing but Flowers.

In North Fitzroy on the window of a vacant commercial/industrial building.

For those of you not quite old enough to know what this is in reference to, here's David Byrne from Talking Heads.

Happy knitted dumplings on a tree...

... Yarn bombing at Melbourne University.

"Ermahgerd I'm in Aida!"

Lately I've taken to looking at the faces of each individual in large group photos. It has proved rewarding/hilarious. In the Opera Australia printed program is the following group shot from Aida where everyone looks serious...



Ermahgerd I'm in Aida!

Dandelion root coffee tips

Previously my housemate F, and I went to CERES open day back in July where I enjoyed a dandelion latte at the cafe. It has a pleasant earthy, nutty taste. After that it seemed worthwhile to try making my own dandelion coffee.  I dug up about a bucket's worth of weed, trimmed them back using poultry shears and washed them as throughly as I could, chopped, roasted and food processed them into a coffee like powder. The washing part of the process is the most labour intensive.

Among the countless roots we handled there was this little guy who deserved a close up and is the main reason why you get to read this at all. Other tutorials are sufficient, though after writing this I realise they don't give you exactly the same tips about cleaning. What started out as context for a picture post has become a partial instructional piece.




We had a two person working bee* collecting all of the dandelion we could find to make dandelion coffee. We had decided to reseed the 'lawn' so harvesting dandelion was a byproduct of that process. We made several batches of coffee and found it was slightly less onerous doing it between us. However F no longer finds the smell of it appetising and has not drunk any of it as coffee. More on that later.

After about six or so batches within a week this is what I found to be the best way to clean the roots:

• Agitating the roots in a bucket of water gives limited results. A sieve or mesh and a hose - over a bucket if you want to collect the water - worked a lot better and used less water.
• Trim away all trace of stalk and greenery using poultry shears. They're good for fine snipping and wet objects.
• Wash them in the kitchensink, immersing them in a bowl of water - wear rubber gloves because you're going to be there a while. Use a butterknife to gouge out any fiddly cruddy bits.

I popped online to read a few tutorials and slapped it together based on more than one set of instructions. You could say I followed this one, however this one seems to have some goods ideas that I might try if I/we ever do it again. We used a granite mortar and pestle to grind the later batches for a more even grind and less to clean up. The roasted roots caused some slight scratching to the food processor bowl and discolouration so processing before roasting might be worth exploring. Note that 250F is about 121C ie a cool oven. I made the mistake of thinking that the instructions mentioning 250 degrees in more than one instructional were in celsius and over roasted my first batch. The coffee beverage from that was fine but an unappetising grey!

One bucket - about 10 litres - of untrimmed roots yields about a quarter of a cup of coffee grounds at best. I make dandelion coffee by running it through my stove top coffee pot using similar amounts as I would for regular coffee grounds. It's lovely sweetened with honey. Limit yourself to one cup though because although it's caffiene free, like coffee it can still have a diuretic and a laxative effect.

F made a rum infusion and served it at our party on the weekend in a cocktail. She took a quarter of a cup of dandelion root grounds and infused it for about 3 weeks in a 700ml bottle of light rum. She then strained it using muslin. We came up with the idea of serving it with a melon balled scoop of vanilla icecream in a shot sized glass as a sort of affogato. It was delicious and our guests seemed to enjoy it. This infusion cocktail is recommended only for recreational purposes in responsible amounts - other sites mention similar alcohol infusions for medicinal use by the spoonful.

F writes: 'White rum. 4 shots infusion, 3 shots milk, 1 shot honey water. Shake with ice, put little ice-cream balls in 8 glasses, pour over. Honey water = honey:water 1:1'


*Can it still be called that if it's just two of you?

More Spring blooms

Aquilegia


Ajuga

Tarzan's endless chin

I found a bag of mostly boys' toys at hardwaste in my area. In amongst the obligatory McDonald's toys was this odd object. It is most likely for the Disney version of Tarzan.



Gorilla carrying a human baby aspect aside, there is something weird about this toy. I think it the way the baby's head has an endless chin as it shoves its head out of the blanket - like he's poking his creepy little head out of a cannon. Yes I think that's what it is.

Talk like a Pirate / Corgi Day - Yaaarrf!

Captain Juan Blacktoe* - AKA Fonzie the Corgi - contemplates the muddy waters off  NewTurf Island.


*so named for he has one black toenail, the other fifteen are pink.

Queensland Sanctions Shooting Threatened Bats

I understand that the fruit industry is important to the state of Queensland but so is its natural beauty and wildlife. This is an ineffectual and cruel way to deal with loss of crops. It needs to be stopped. I would have thought endangered and vulnerable species' survival was more important in the long term than any crop. The government could be subsidising netting not allowing shooting. Why does wildlife need to have a dollar value before its custodians care for it?


 Series IV, Pod II, detail*
modelled on the grey headed flying fox

Please help stop this slaughter by sending an email from here / signing the petition here!



Series IV, Little Reds, detail*
modelled on the litte red flying fox

*Images of my sculptures taken from my folio blog here.

Melbourne University Cultural Treasures - Part 2, The Medical History Museum, Real Steam punk!

In conjunction with the Melbourne Open House program, various collections at Melbourne University were open to the public as part of their Cultural Treasures Festival. Following on from Part 1, Zoology here is Part 2,The Medical History Museum. Note that the museum is open to visitors throughout the year.

The museum includes a relocated Victorian Pharmacy of which I took no pictures. It's a very small space!

I am conflicted when it comes to the Steampunk genre. I love Victorian age imagery and style, incorporating it into my art and to an extent my interior, and clothing. I have always been interested in science particular natural history. Steampunk is therefore up my alley as far as the things I'm enthusiastic about. However some of it is downright silly. The gratuitous/thoughtless use of gears, goggles worn on hats never on eyes, and ridiculous ray guns kinda gets my goat but not as much as it does my BF's
'Some of you are keenly aware of my misgivings regarding this whole Steampunk thing. Today NG provided me with the tools to succinctly opine at any given moment. Therefore, instances of that which has hitherto been referred to as "Steampunk", yet exclusively places aesthetic over substance (i.e. damn near the whole sodding movement), I shall henceforth refer to as "SteamPimp". Reserving Steampunk for applications where cogs might intersect in a meaningful and possibly even functional manner.'

As it turns out they have been doing it wrong. Yes cogs and copper are pretty but real Victorian scientific gadgets are mostly made with brass and they have knobs. Sometimes these knobs are knurled. Sometimes there is a wormgear but otherwise, they aren't bedazzled with gears!


Lister's carbolic acid steam spray
c. 1880
A particularly pretty example of this device as it turns out. What do you do with it? Sterilise the operating theatre in a hospital.


Microruling machine
c.1910
Unfortunately the accompanying label did not explain what it does - though none of the other labels on things did either. Here you go: link. Essentially it rules microscopic lines very close together on a piece of glass to create diffraction patterns from which to calibrate the field of view under a microscope and stuff. Clear as mud? You're welcome.


X-ray tubes
c.1905
They are a bit like a lightbulbs but instead of visible light they emit x-rays: link.


Compound monocular and binocular microscope c. 1864


Compound monocular microscope
c. 1820


More microscopes
c. late 1800s


Compound monocular microscope c. late 1800s

Spring blooms

Some spring flowers in my garden.


Apricot blossom bud


Bluebells


Freesias. It's a pity the camera can't capture the lovely fragrance! I put a couple of sprigs in a vase to delicately scent the lounge room.


Violets. There are enough of them to be smellable when hanging the wash out if the wind/temperature - or lack there of - is right.

Melbourne University Cultural Treasures - Part 1, Zoology

In conjunction with the Melbourne Open House program, various collections at Melbourne University were open to the public as part of their Cultural Treasures Festival. I made a bee line for the Zoology collection, checked out the BioMed library, and finished in the Pathology and Anatomy Collection (no photographs allowed out of respect for the humans who donated their bodies to science, and thus these collections).

I took photos of specimens which helped me identify some in my own collection, as well as the most weird and cute - yes even a dead thing can be cute.






Mammalian foetuses are bitter sweet and peaceful. Photographing on a mobile phone through two layers of glass presents a challenge, in the case of pickled specimens so I couldn't capture all of my favourites.

A solid meal

Seen last week in the city, corner of Latrobe and Elizabeth Streets. This is the first time I've seen a sculpture as street art. This must have taken a while to produce, and the person who made is is obviously experienced at casting things in concrete. I admire that level of commitment, especially to something that will either be removed by the council or souvenired by a fellow admirer - I did think about it in hindsight. The skull among the sesame seeds is a nice touch. The discarded Maccas box just happened to be nearby.