FLUFFY TOWN

hey, friends?

2011-01-19T08:48:00.003+11:00

Hello,

ok, unlike my promise, I didn't write in English for ages. Not that I didn't think of my Fluffy town friends. Quite the opposite actually. I had news from Zio, from Jenz, and that's about it. Pala a bit sooner. But that's about it.
So here is to you who stil wonder at times.
I've been hearing the awful news of floods in Queensland and Victoria, but the media here is so myopic that I dunno what's going on. Sure, I should read the SNW every day, but frankly, I can't. MAybe the AGe? To be continued. I dream of you guys telling me of what's important and sensible to you from the teevee, newspapers, gossip news, just the way you would if we'd meet in the garden at coffee time. It's in this hope that I keep n writing this (broken) English blog.
Anyway, I hope you'e all right.
I met another Strine fellow two days ago in the metro, Danny Pata, the NAS teacher, aginst all odds, even though I know he travels quite often to Paris. I was back from the AUteuil greenhouses, and here he was with his wife, equal to himself.

Abeltm@centrepompidou

2010-10-22T23:59:00.003+11:00

Until next February, as part of the exhibition Elles@centrepompidou, my badge "la Barbe", one of which is owned by the Kandinsky Library, associate to the Musée d'Art Moderne de la ville de Paris, is on display in a window, along with works about Gender Confusion, amongst works by Orlan, Pablo Picasso et Marcel Duchamp.
Go and visit it while it is still time!

"la Manche" or "Rom Story"

2010-10-20T17:41:00.005+11:00

Let's start by a N.B.: "faire la manche" means "to beg". But literally, it says "do the sleeve" or "do the Channel".
Now, let's really start.
Dear Friends of "la belle France" who intend to come here or dream to do it, you might know or not know we are facing a great amount of beggars on publics spaces, due to the shrinking of the public funding in general. Three people per trip, as an average.
Yesterday, the first one I refused, saying I was poor and broke. The third one as well. I had already given.
Indeed. The second guy was playing the violin, a funny one with a trumpet as a resounding device, he was singing melodiously enough in a slavic language, and yes I am broke, but no one rich would give anyone any money, wouldn't they? Being broke is the one reason why we display solidarity among each other.
Next time I'll tell you about Christine Delphy on rich and poor countries (what, you are francophile and don't know her? vite, a google search!)

Unemployment

2010-09-04T03:51:00.004+10:00

Hey Friends,

well, I don't know if there's anybody Australian interested by my French tribulations in Paris, but maybe a few are... and anyway they have a good value of intercultural jewels.

As you know or not, i am currently looking for a long-term job? I was a life-model in Sydney, mainly at the National Art School and other sketch-clubs, but here I have no network, so it doesn't work. Besides, the job is well-payed but boring as you just need to stay still for a few hours, and that's it.

I founded my own translation company (anyone interested by their autobiography or last academic publication or doctorate translated into Molière's idiom get to me on www.transtexte.com, ok? ;)
But it's not enough, and I am running around looking for any position with a steady wage.

Today was an example of forecast failure.
Morning weather:
10 am. Job interview in an art gallery in the 15th district. The 15th is the white bourgeoise hospital of Paris city.
The gallery dealer has little in common with Stephen Mori. 40 cm higher, no beard, a classy beige outfit... Little did I say, not nothing. The guy has more money but will do any bricolage he can to spare money in the gallery, explain life to you as if he had more clue, be proud of the art work he shows (ach, the Leonor Fini drawings are a marvel, I mussay) but irritated if you compare it with anything he doesn't value so much for his clientele (like Marlene Dumas!!!). Very polite but acts like a fieffé bully. Has no clue about life in general so he keeps on sticking to what he knows and what gets him power and security.
The clientele is vulgaar, fat and well-dressed. Old white rich men, one of them obese and compulsively swallowing mint loolies the wrapping he throws anywhere he estimates discreet.
Ecoeurant, disgusting in a sugary kind of way, the French say.
The job is about flânerie: going around town and sticking posters about the next show in shopkeepers windows. With their agreement, and tracing them so the gallery can recontact them and convince them they display the ad material for free, with cheap tricks such as inviting them at the opening and offering them a glass of champagne.

2pm. I am applying to an unlikely job offered by Paris townhall. Gravedigger. Written examination in an examination center. We are some 200 candidate. I am the only woman, they say. Which, I am proud of myself, make them say "Messieurs et Madame" instead of just "Messieurs". Who are the "Messieurs"? a lot of migrants, chocolate, macchiato, latte and flat white colours, a few punks with they dirty rangers and safety pins in the ear,... and me.
10 questions about professional live situations.
Nb 1, easy one: you wake up at 8.30 am and you were meant to be at work at 8.00 shaaaârp. What do you do?
Aoh, shit, whatchya think? I juss throw the alarm clock onto the thickest wall, crash, go back to bed and call at about 7.50pm, when I do actually wake up... (this is an approximative version)
Nb2: people at the funeral ceremony start fighting. What can and must you do? Dunno, hit them all stronger than they do each other? too bad, I am not a karate black belt. Besides, I remember Bruce Lee died in a silly bad fight accident, didn't he? Calm down, calm down, and calm them down. Or call the security person, hey?
Nb 7: The people partaking the ceremony offer you food and (alcoholic) beverages. They get super-upset that you refuse. What then? I refuse, take any excuse to ground my refusal. If they start a diplomatic accident, I accept the whole lot and throw it into the next piece of bush.
Etc.

And what if I never worked again? If it was not for the financial side, I would do it happily. Why do emloyers interview you like the money side of the work had absolutely no weight in the matter?

le choc du changement, le poids de l'inertie

2010-08-23T20:24:00.003+10:00

Eté 2010. La gare St Lazare est en travaux. Déflocage massif : tout l'amiante doit disparaître; or, il y en a partout. La foule massive des voyageurs de banlieue et de Normandie cavale en troupeaux dans un labyrinthe de couloirs aveugles murés de contreplaqué blanc, bleu et rose. Au détour de cette modernisation nécessaire des locaux, on a supprimé le robinet d'eau potable qui se trouvait derrière les voies pour Versailles et Saint-Nom-la-Bretèche. Désormais, si on veut boire de l'eau, il faudra s'acheter une bouteille en plastique dans un distributeur automatique. Ou, si on est plus malin, demander un verre d'eau du robinet chez le premier limonadier venu. Depuis Richard Wallace, c'est une disposition légale dans les cafés, bistrots, brasseries et autres débits de boisson : nul ne peut vous refuser de vous donner un verre d'eau.

Devant les mutations cancérifères des années ultra-libérales (depuis les années 80, disons), les mentalités résistent et s'accrochent cependant à des reliquats du temps de la démocratie sociale. Ainsi, malgré l'avènement du pass navigo à la ratp-sncf, (dont l'organisme de gestion commun , le stiff, porte superbement bien son nom, puisqu'en anglais, stiff = "rigide"), les guichets annoncent toujours qu'on peut acheter... des cartes oranges!

De même, la plupart des gens que je connais parlent du Pôle emploi, qui a regroupé l'ANPE et les ASSEDICS, sous le nom d'ANPE, et tout le monde se comprend.

Alors, que veut dire cette résistance aux nouveaux sigles et aux nouvelles institutions? pourquoi sommes-nous si rétifs aux réformes des institutions sociales? Vous aves une réponse, vous? moi j'ai une question (de plus!): ne serait-ce pas que ces "changements" répétés sont des dégradations des conditions sociales antérieures?

Ich bin ein Painter

2010-08-14T09:58:00.001+10:00

Never mind I don't have a proper studio. Let's turn it into a political act: public space was not made for market only; painting is an activity any painter should make in the street.

I am not a radical beliver in the matter. I paint in the inner courtyard of the building I am living in, but anyone passing by is unanimous: my paitings about Paris roofs are grreat. Will they buy when I sell?
.... to be continued.

I'm a poor lonesome painter and I'm far away from Oz

2010-04-07T05:44:00.002+10:00

Hi there.

here I am in Paris trying to find a place such as the one I left in Erko last year.
I.e. a lost paradise called alpha, where I had a house to live in along with a bunch of cool (most of'em) mad (aaaall of'em:) a studio space to do any artistic experiment in, and a really nice suburb around to jump around on some of these days...
... and now after eight months, still looking for a painting studio and a job, I can tell you guys and grrlz, keep on dreaming of Paris, because this is not the funny place you think it is.

Do you know that joke about a bloke who's getting bored as hell after an eternity in paradise? He asks for a holiday and has extra good time in heaven. Now, after coming back to paradise and enduring an unbearable eternity of boring bliss, he decides he wants to go back to hell for one more holiday.
'- Ok you can, man', St Peter says, 'but you can never come back. It's definite.'
'- No worries, Sir' the dude utters, full of anticipation.
And jumps in hell again.
But this time, he's greated by kicks in the ass, he's chained and put to work on a filthy industrial line.
'-Hey what's wrong here, am I not at the great place I was before?' he asks to one of the brutes guarding him and other damned. And the other, kicking him again in the chest:
'-Arh, arh, arh! can't you tell the difference between holiday and migration?!'

e-growth

2010-02-23T17:21:00.004+11:00

Part of our wonderful serial: 'What a wonderful world', here we go:
Yes! Growth is definitely on, dear Michael Moore fans: the growth of e-junk and e-garbage is exponentially growing. Developped countries send their junk to India, China, other under-developped, oh, sorry, developping countries, so they don't have to deal with recycling metals and componants; destroying the last componants implies toxic chemicals, acids and solvents, which employee handle with their bare hands.
....'And what's the point to recycle anything, industrial mining companies say, while we can extract it from wild lands we'll destroy forever? only tourists and Aborigines would miss them, wouldn't they? Well, they just get a computer and a job and they'll forget about their land...'
Oh, dear.
I know, you and me are using a computer, as you're reading what I wrote, but can't we have an effective recycling industry, as part of our world? hey?
(after reading a 'le Monde' newspaper article by Laurent Checola)

Have a great year, mates!

2010-01-11T22:15:00.005+11:00

My new adventures in France:
will I find the studio space where I can handle oil paint on the large scale I love (cf: A Rainforest Night Dream, one of my favorite works, 2.4x1.2m), or will I have to specialise in small books binding and computer arts? Notice my efforts regarding vectorial drawing, hey? ;-)

What a Drag! / la Barbe! then Map the Soul of the Planet!!

2009-06-03T18:28:00.011+10:00

Come and enjoy my show at the Mori Gallery, 168 Day Street, Sydney 2000, Town Hall Station, opening Wednesday 10th of June 2009 and running till Saturday 4th of July. If you are wondering about gender, feminist issues, virile values threatened by parity and how men get alarmed, panicked even! about it, come and enjoy the videos, photos, texts and performance! Then maybe you too shall put on a beard! (There will be some that fits your best sulks and smiles) Anthropology and Politics and Visual thoughts on new media, technoogies but still obsolete mentalities around sexism and its avatars, this is what this show is about, an open forum to debate about those highly post-modern, reccurent and crucial issues.

.... then, on Friday 12th of June 2009, come to Alpha House Artits Co-operative Gallery, 226 Union Street, Erskineville, for a second show of mine, Map the Soul of the Planet! This time, it is an ecological and epistemological concern that animates the images I questioned:
Given the canonical representations of space, countries and land, what part does our imagination play in attributing a certain part of truth to them. How do we, as human beings, relate to them and have a certain knowledge, or belief about them? Come and think, or dream, in front of these borders turned into characters caught in an imaginary situation. Come and share a moment with the artist, as this is my ultimate show before leaving the country (maybe forever!!)

His-story & his-steric

2009-05-29T17:11:00.004+10:00

Let's do a bit of cratylism (cf: Plato, Cratylus); i.e. let's interpret words according to the parts they're composed of, as if they had a meaning as well as the word itself:
History was made by men for men in the sphere of the public space where women are excluded a priori. We shall then deduce that history, his-story, is a manifestation of his-sterics: 'steric' relates to the spatial arrangement of atoms around in a molecule, the 'Free dictionary online' tells us. Therefore, his-sterics designate the science of the way men arrange around themselves what they consider to be an extension of their beings, their belongings, from the house, the war, to the wife, and the mental certitudes of such a patrimonial and matrimonial arrangement.
And they wanted to make us believe that 'hysteric' is a woman's thing?! No way. Even if this is more a joyous delirium than a serious theoretical reflection on etymology and epistemology, it has its part of wisdom, if your imagination is based on but goes further than your straight reason ;-)

Banks and borders

2009-05-15T16:17:00.005+10:00

Banks are national things: when they're bankrupt, in these times of crisis for instance, it is us, citizens, that fund it out of our good heart; when times are prosperously bubbly (cf: Klein, N. the Shock Doctrine, 2008)they pretend to outreach states. Still, if you want to transfer money from one country to another, you'll have to pay so much money you won't have any left.
Anyway, I reckon banks should pay their customers in order to dispose of their money for their speculation schemes.

A country and its doubles.

2009-05-01T20:55:00.004+10:00

For the ones who didn't recognize Tibet in the previous post, you still missed the point, guys. Now, you may object:
"- hey, Fluff, Tibet is not really a country, it is not recognized as such by the Chinese, it is officially a province;
- which Tibet are you referring to anyway? it's had several borders along history, so how did you choose along them?
- You didn't make it look like someone Tibetan!"

Look, hey? What? no TIbetan person would be likely to recline in front of a 16/9 screen teevee with a remote in their left hand, in a luxurious lounge-room where ancient and modern art cohabitate in an (almost) kitsch harmony? Even if they were not deemed "representative"?

But what is representative? What we perceive through the global media? the official history of a place? people we know from there, even if they don't look like clichés we accept as such?

A country is mostly the vast amount we imagine from the little we knwow.

M-A-P.

2009-04-06T17:08:00.004+10:00

If you hadn't recognized the map of Kuwait in the last message, that's 0 point for you. Now, a map is the shape of a country at a given moment of history. For example this beautiful pouting odalisque watching teevee from her sofa has the opulent shape of a country that does not really exist as such nowadays. It's just the reminiscence of some period of its history. Which country-which-is-not-a country?
Once you find which country hides behind this character, you will think, isn't it bizarre to represent that country by that character? What is the common point? Well, does it HAVE TO BE a common point? Can anyone deduce the reality of a country by its mapped representation? Is it because you watch a country on google earth that you actually KNOW that country?

Map question.

2009-01-08T20:52:00.003+11:00

What are maps? Do they represent a reality or are they just a figment of our imagination?
The answer lies somewhere between these two statements. En route from one to the other, in order to be comprehensive, wouldn't we need to map out the subject?

Misunderstanding is human.

2008-07-12T05:03:00.003+10:00

Heyyyyy!
Someone, a courageous "Anonymous", sent me a comment about the Pacific Blackbox disaster; saying i was whining, I was unprofessional and "they" were right. A patch of beige prose, from someone who obviously cannot make the difference between "whining" and anger, that great creative force (cf: the story of Hephaistos, Ares and Aphrodite in the Greek mythology, the story of Vulcan, Mars and Venus in the Latin one), and the will to fight for justice, peace, freedom, dialog, integrity, difference, no matter what opposition and obstacle spirals against you.

Arf, arf, arf!
This is no barking, dear "Anonymous", and just remember (or learn?) what Voltaire said of such sensitive morons as you are: "I do not agree with what you are saying but I will fight to my death for you to have the right to say it". Don't you think, as another writer unknown from you said, it is a pleasure close to gluttony to be called a cretin by an idiot?

Next time, i'll tell you about Callan Park and the dislocation of the Rozelle Psychiatric Hospital to Concord. There are so many areas worth fighting for some dignity in these days...

Salo or the 120 days of Sodom

2008-05-29T13:05:00.008+10:00

Salo or the 120 days of Sodom, by Pier Paolo Pasolini, 1975.

If you want to make films, you cannot ignore that masterpiece. Its visual richness matches the power of its purpose. It is a visual adaptation drawn from texts by Donatien de Sade, Roland Barthes, Pierre Klossowsky, Maurice Blanchot, Simone de Beauvoir, Philippe Sollers. Because of its abstractness, it is a most radical statement about hierarchical relationships of power, history, human nature, and cinema itself.

In an insular castle, notables of the republic of Salo, Lombardy, Italy, train a group of youth in a totalitarian spirit, and apply in the straightest manner an array of rules which sole aim is their own pleasure.

“Indeed, the true and only anarchy is power.”

The whole film takes place in a doubly enclosed space: the city of Salo is surrounded by water, representing the political isolation of the republic in its historical context; within the city, the castle is enclosed in a circular quickset hedge concretising the isolation of the youth out the outside world. The action is organised in three topical circles, directly drawn from Dante’s Divine Comedy. To this pitiless logic of the spatial and temporal structures, responds the no less straight social organisation of the group. The paradisiacal setting hosts an infernal action.

Strictly hierarchical, that organisation constitutes a structure as symmetrical and hermetically uniting than the neo-classical architecture of the place. Age and gender acting as discriminating factors, a rigorous parity reigns, giving each character their role and position in the hierarchy. The masters, the ‘notables’, call each other ‘Duke’, ‘Excellence’, ‘My Lord’, ‘President’. The symbolic order in Salo is an alliance of moral, military, socio-profesional and political regimes, namely nobility, middle class, church and political class. They are accompanied by four old women who have the double task to publicly tell them tales meant to stimulate their desires, than to make sure these desires are immediately and fully satisfied. The objects and instruments of these are eight young men and eight young women, carefully chosen amongst the population of the city. Eight soldiers enforce the law, and eight servants discretely provide material services.

The unity of the castle is founded on the law, written by the masters. Its aim is to systematise the training provided to the youth during their initiatory stay, ruled in its most minute details. Salo law equally applies to all, but it codifies the desires of the masters, therefore securing their double power, to use the body of the youth at their free will, and to punish them if they transgress the order that objectifies them, if they disobey the leaders they are the subjects of.

The population of the castle is a church, i.e. a religious assembly united by rituals replicating parts of the Christian liturgy to its own ends. All the activities apart from sleep are performed in common; eating, singing, listening to stories, and highly ritualised so as to coerce the individual to give up its critical distance and stick to the values of the group. Solitude and intimacy are repressed, as well as free sexuality, for they threaten the coherence of the flock, which symbolic order is based on the sacrifice of the child. “In the shadows of young girls in flower, they won’t believe their misfortune. They’re listening to the radio, they’re sipping tea. At the degree zero of freedom, they don’t know that middle class has never even hesitated to kill its sons”.

Pacific Black(mail) Box

2008-05-18T10:14:00.020+10:00

The forum Pacific Black Box was not a disaster, but it had its frustrating bits.
More than a month after its end, I finally received news from Taloi Havini, the head of Pacificblackbox inc. Only because I asked via email. Georgia McRae, the spokesperson, kept silent.
Not only did Georgia not acknowledge my input as a technical assistant in the Pacific Black Box (PBB) blog, did Taloi and her leave Buka without even saying good bye to me (too busy again for these formalities?) after three weeks of silence, did Taloi question my attitude in a mail to Stephen Mori, who raised more than 20 000 aud for the PBB forum. I was kept out of the project the whole time I was asked to partake it. In spite of the massive amount of paperwork Taloi and Georgia spent day and night to produce, I never got more than the timetables for the two first days and the program of the opening ceremony in my hands. Maybe the paper was too dear a raw material to be spoilt on keeping a mere assistant informed.
I cannot quite understand, especially a posteriori, at the retrospective view of what happened, why Taloi insisted so much on having me there. I was obviously a pain in the arse for her, any initiative of mine was out of place, like, for instance when I taught youth how to use a computer during their free (unsupervised!!!) time. I ended up being handed as least and as menial tasks as possible, like plugging and unplugging cables, setting up and packing up the projector for the evening gatherings while Georgia and Taloi earned a well deserved rest in their bedroom; I hardly partook the elaboration of the final video during the second week.
In Sydney, we agreed, Taloi, Stephen and I, that I would document the forum and bring back a short documentary we'd show at the Mori Gallery. Then, once in transit in Cairns, Georgia and Taloi made clear that filming was not a priority in my agenda. I was already asking too many questions, raising too many objections that upset them both. Woops. Finally, once arrived in Buka, I was gently blackmailed to give up filming lest my colonialist point of view of occidental woman prevails; I had to sign the working agreement all the facilitators were served with, so that all the images recorded remain the exclusive property of the PBB. It was that or quitting.
Well, call me occidental and colonialist if you want, after all, even if my ancestors were colonised indigenous dudes, background doesn't make one immune to the culture they're exposed to. But then, these adjectives are not less applicable to Taloi, Georgia, and everyone who has embraced the occidental, e.g. the Australian way to lead and rule an indigenous society, than to me. Now, working along with communities and minorities is the most fundamental aspect of my work as a video-maker. I have never released images without the expressed agreement of the persons concerned. I felt and still feel offended by the amount of ignorance and distrust displayed by the PBB organisers towards my work. I regret the impossibility of any dialogue under the continuous pretext that they were too busy; I deplore the censorship upon my point of view as an outsider; I wonder about the ideological control of the images produced during and after the forum.

The actual Pacificblackbox inc. seems to be on stand-by. Their blog hasn't been updated for nearly four weeks, and "Comments on this blog are restricted to team members", you're gently told if you or anyone tries to leave a message.
I wish I was wrong and too impatient and emotional about it. But I am pessimistic about the posterity of this forum now. Please, someone, prove me I am in the wrong!

Pacific Blackbox

2008-03-20T15:43:00.006+11:00

... is the name of a forum that'll take place in Buka Island, northern Bougainville Island, between the 1st and the 15th of April 2008.

35 to 40 youth will train in video-making so they can use that powerful medium to voice their point of view and immediately testify for themselves about their condition, namely the progressive disappearance of their island under an ever-rising sea, the emotional consequence on themselves and their community, and all the reflexion they want to bring on a such a matter as global warming, their present, their future.

I am going to provide them with technical training, so they can shoot, edit and publish their movies; i also am going to record this process from a to z, from alpha to omega, so it becomes part of an extended community's memory. Coz we're all concerned, whether or not we're aware. We, as humans on this planet of a space.

got my treatment against malaria, to be taken every day, two days prior the trip to what the touristic clichés refer to as a corner of Paradise, and two weeks afterwards. Yeah, touristic clichés. They always mention the white sand beach and the coconut-trees, but never acknowledge that the most numerous beach boys and girls are the couples of mosquitoes Noah should have kicked out of his arch....

next step: the trip. It takes a stop-over in Cairns, then Port-Moresby in Papua (New Guinea) then Buka itself. I start on good Friday 2008, and won't get there before Christ was reborn on the Monday you know or don't know. Isn't that a spiritual journey?

In Buka, there's just dial-up internet link, so who knows when I can give you some news???
Keep in touch though, might be soon!

your Fluff!

Pacific Blackbox

2008-03-20T15:43:00.000+11:00

Facing Defacement

2008-02-27T20:40:00.003+11:00

... is the name of my next show at the Mori Gallery (168 Day St, Sydney 2000).
It is a video tryptich with strong visual based on a range of maps and landscape photos; it builds up a metaphorical link between real estate development going out of measure and proliferation of the cancerous cell.

It is a mapping of a disaster to come if no-one objects ; like going beyond the seducing aesthetics of maps and plans, into their zones of shades and deceipts. It is a way to invite the viewer to reconsider the transparency value they attribute to maps and master plans; to take full awareness of the political, emotional, power-driven,always superlatively passionate hubris at stakes in those documents always based, though, on the straightest rational grounds.

Or so they say? And who's they and why do they say so? So many questions, hey?

Opening Wednesday 5th March 2008, 6 to 8 pm, and running till the 29th.

There will be no development in Sandon Point!

2007-12-02T20:59:00.000+11:00

It might be a very good coincidence because of te political agenda and the fact that, as someone told me recently, the most powerful measures an alternative government is taking during its reign is within fifteen days.

However, check this article (from the Sydney Morning Herald)

A change in climate for developers

Sunanda Creagh, Urban Affairs Reporter
November 28, 2007

GOVERNMENTS will be forced to consider how climate change and rising sea levels will affect all future urban developments after a ruling in the Land and Environment Court yesterday.

Justice Peter Biscoe overturned a decision by the Planning Minister, Frank Sartor, to allow the property developer Stockland to build up to 285 homes and an aged-care facility at beachside Sandon Point, 14 kilometres north of Wollongong.

Justice Biscoe found Mr Sartor had failed to consider "whether changed weather patterns would lead to an increased flood risk in connection with the proposed development in circumstances where flooding was identified as a major constraint on development of the site".

The case was brought by a Sandon Point resident, Jill Walker, who lodged her last-minute case against the minister even before she had found a lawyer. Ms Walker argued the developer had failed to conduct thorough flood-risk mapping of the site. Stockland's plan to "re-engineer" creeks would lead to increased flood risk when sea levels rose and weather patterns became more unpredictable because of global warming, she said.

Ms Walker said yesterday she was thrilled by the court finding. "I am half-surprised; I thought we had a 50-50 chance. I am really pleased because so many people worked so hard to get here to save Sandon Point and it's been worth it," she said.

Ms Walker's victory is being hailed as a triumph by her solicitor at the Environmental Defender's Office. "I think it does set a precedent for requiring consideration of climate-change issues in relation to urban development," Josie Walker said . "This judgment will require decision-makers to consider how developments will be impacted by climate change. Previous judgments dealt only with how projects would contribute to climate change."

The judgment would also force developers to tailor future projects to meet principles of ecologically sustainable development in order to get building approval from a council or the Government.

"It will make everyone realise that climate change is impacting on our everyday life," Ms Walker said. "To get an approval you have to think: how is this [development] going to be affected by climate change? This judgment acknowledges that climate changes is real and needs to be considered in relation to all developments but particular coastal developments."

Justice Biscoe's decision follows a historic court finding last year on the Anvil Hill coalmine, in which Justice Nicola Pain found Mr Sartor had failed to consider the impact the new mine would have on the ozone layer.

In yesterday's judgment, Justice Biscoe called climate change a "deadly serious issue", referencing recent reports by the UN's Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change.

"Climate change presents a risk to the survival of the human race and other species ... It has been increasingly under public scrutiny for some years. No doubt that is because of global scientific support for the existence and risks of climate change and its anthropogenic causes," he said. "Climate-change flood risk is, prima facie, a risk that is potentially relevant to a flood-constrained coastal-plain development such as the subject project."

He said it was in the public interest to factor global warming into a consideration of flood risk, but the minister had failed to do so before approving a concept plan for redevelopment of Sandon Point.

The campaign to save Sandon Point has stretched back more than 20 years. An Aboriginal tent embassy was set up there in 2000.

The Planning Minister pointed out that the judgment found no basis to Ms Walker's two other claims that he had failed to consider the recommendations of a 2003 inquiry into Sandon Point and that the approved concept plan was incomplete.

"The minister has been advised that the court found against his decision on one technical issue out of three," a spokesman for Mr Sartor said yesterday. "The Department of Planning is studying the decision and it would not be appropriate to comment further at this stage."

A spokeswoman for Stockland said: "We are currently reviewing the lengthy judgment. We will await further advice from the Department of Planning on the implications of the court's decision before making further comment."

The executive director of the Nature Conservation Council, Cate Faehrmann, said scientists had proved "climate change will cause seas to rise and that many coastal properties are at risk. So why is it taking so long for the State Government to get this and plan appropriately?"

thank you Mr Sartor!

2007-11-16T18:42:00.000+11:00

UTS is being sold.
SCA is being relocated out of Callan Park.
Sandon Point, deemed to be developped only as a regional park, is handed over for Stockland to build the upper-class suburb of Woollongong.

What's next?
When did a democratic process take place to take over these plans?
What's left to do?

Captain Co-ock

2007-10-26T18:10:00.000+10:00

Captain Stockland is going to frock the world
Captain Cook is going to fry Australia
Captain Cock doesn't need mayonnaise.

thanx Jenny Sloot for the f...(antasti)c footage. Anyone passing by Hyde Park, Sydney, can have that vision larger than life size. Now, if you feel like signalling the content of that video as obscene, please call the mayor of Fluffy Town as well!

A Letter to Margaret Mayhem

2007-10-24T12:15:00.000+10:00

This is a letter my girlfriend Jenny asked me to publish as a back up to the one she sent to Margaret, my ex, who occasionally mentions her and me in her blog, in a very personal, and therefore objectable, manner. This is an unabbreged unedited version, identical to the original one I give you the link of.

"Last night, Anna told me your PhD was in 2008/01.

So, if the 2008/03/01 (1st March, 1 month later) you didn't :

1. wrote on your blog : "Sorry Anna, I've been too far. I shouldn't tell so much rubbish about you, but I was so sad that I lost my mind. I didn't really think all I wrote here.".

2. tell to Alpha House's people : "Sorry Anna, I've been too far. I shouldn't tell so much rubbish about you, but I was so sad that I lost my mind. I didn't really think your worse that a rapist."
The last sentence I put in bold, it's fair I think, just tell it to :
Andrew, Chris, Shay and Jens - the people who were there this sad Thursday, when you said that to Anna.
I don't forget Ben and Alison, but they're not Anna's room-mates - Jens is your own room-mate, I don't know how write her name...

I will send my letter to all people I met in Australia (in Australia only ;) I think my french friends doesn't care at all about what you can write and tell.
And I won't tell it to Anna's family, because it's too private, and I know you love them).

I'm not ok to threat you that way.
But you just came to far!
Someone should try to calm you a little bit, I think. You know, somebody "gave me a strong lesson", a long time ago, and I just thanks her now (don't worry, I don't want you to thanks me, or to be sorry for me ;)

So, you have more than 4 months to act ;)

Publié par Jenny à l'adresse 18:44 0 commentaires

A commentary on Margaret’s blog

I wanted to post it on your own blog (http://minoumayhem.blogspot.com/), but maybe it's too long, so I wrote it here...

Sydney, the 19th October 2007

A commentary on Margaret’s blog

In response about what you told:

- the Thursday 13th September 2007, in the evening, in Alpha House - a lot of people were there (but the worse things you told were in French, so they could not understand!)

- here on your blog

Margaret, it’s a quite violent letter for you. So, maybe you should not read it today if you’re not strong enough today, ok?

Just read Note 1 and 2; ok? ;)

Read the letter when you will be strong enough.
I wrote it for you, using a dictionary (I was alone, in Sydney) so you can read it several times if you want.

Note 1:

It’s me, Jenny, who wrote (and think) this, it’s not Anna.

So don’t shout after her about what I write and think, ok? Because you hurt her already so deeply… it’s ok, you did a good job, you can stop attacking her… (attack me if you like, I don’t care… but I guess you don’t care either, no?)

When you tell some of your personal stories - or worse, tell another person’s personal story, as it seems that you’re used to do it on your blog - you take several risks:

* first, you tell a lot about yourself and
* 2nd the “other” can argue too ;)

So, in a way… I’m this “Other” – you can insult me, say I’m lying, I’m quite far in France (I quit Australia the 25th October) AND I’m not dangerous for you ;)

Note 2:

As you can see, reading this letter, I don’t trust you, even if I respect you (and your history and pains).
I’m unhappy and angry for a lot of reasons… I won’t tell here on a blog.

But the problem is that you wrote and yielded some horrible stuff, in public and so loud, I can’t let you act that way, without write back and tell the truth I know!

I think you won’t put this letter here (on your blog), as I think it would be fair, just because of all those horrible things you yielded (that Thursday) and because of those you wrote here too.

So, I have to copy it on another blog, because I know you can change this letter on your own blog ;)

Or you could pretend that Anna had modify it.

- Maybe on Anna’s blog - if she’s okay after she will read it. (and I'm okay if she wants to write too)

- But if she’s not ok for that (because she wants to protect you and/or she could have fear from you and your own violence, and/or have some peace in her flat), I will take an other space, and I’m sorry to tell you that in this case, I will send the link (with this letter) to several people here in Alpha House.

Because I want you to read it, several time, later and I want it unfalsified (if this word is correct??? I’m not sure, hope you’ll understand anyway).

So, I think it would be better to publish this letter, here, on your own blog ;)

If you do:

* 1st you can write back to me, and
* 2nd I hope you’ll say “I’m sorry, I went too far” to Anna (and people who can read your blog and friends here in alpha and in Sydney, so they can hear you saying that).

(

We told you “sorry”, with every body listening, for you, this Thursday in alpha.

But after that, you told these horrible things, in English and the worse was in French - so people here couldn’t understand the worse – you’re very smart, Margaret…

But unfortunately, I guess one day you could pay for that (it will be not me or Anna, as I’ve got my truth and own conscience, for me, like she has hers for her : we don’t need to hurt you). I mean you could meet in the future (I don’t want that for you, and that why I took time to write you that long letter), if you’re still acting that way with friends or lover, you could meet a really nasty people who could hurt you very deeply – not friendly as we are, but violent as you are.

I say that because I just want you happy and secure, as I want Anna to be happy and that you 2 can become friends (later, but don’t wait too long – we don’t know when she’ll come back to France…).

And I think it’s not fair you can tell Anna, such horrible things, without say “sorry” after – in fact, I even think that nobody (specially a woman) should tell such a thing to a friend or ex-lover, even to her best enemy.

)

----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Here’s is the “main letter”.

Once again, Margaret, it’s a quite violent letter for you.
So, maybe you should not read it today if you’re not strong enough today, ok?

- Question: from where I talk?
Answers:

1. I’m Jenny, Anna’s partner.
I’m French and I’m a post-feminist queer.
I came in Australia to support Anna, because YOU are hurting her, Margaret. Sorry, but you’re NOT the only one to suffer!

I try to love her the best I can - it’s not easy for me – and it’s not fair for her she meets people like you and me, I think ! But never mind, it’s her choice, as a human subject I like to think ;)

In your blog, you call her Abel I think… But most people know who she is: Anna is the women you “loved” for many years - I have to say I’m not quite sure you really loved her, (cause I think maybe you can’t, I mean it would be too dangerous for you? Reading the 2nd big paragraph will explain better what I try to say, as I’m not fluent in English).

Anna is French, as me, and moreover, she has a colonialised history in her family (I mean her family is a victim of the french colonialism in Algeria).
It’s more difficult, for a love story, to not have the same language (and culture). It’s not so easy to talk about strong and painful feelings in an other language. I know you don’t want to see and recognize that: it’s ok, it’s human – maybe it’s a white people stuff ?
But as you are an intelligent person, and specially working on queer stuffs (then working on differences and personal/public power), you should/have to understand, intellectually, that’s it’s easier for you, and there’s a lot of impacts on the way you 2 see and can talk about your past common life - as you’re white, Australian, and fluent in English speaking and she’s not! As a consequence, you are more confident, you’ve got more personal power than her for fighting – especially when you come to cry when there’s a lot of people here in Alpha to listen you, or on your blog, with all those people watching and listening what you yield (I mean shout) and cry.

If you don’t understand that, I think you should change of studies, see? I understand you were angry this Thursday, that your feelings just disturbed your mind and intelligence.

But I think you should say, to everybody (here, to your friends and in Alpha’s houses): that you’re sorry, that you were wrong, that you didn’t really think what you said (and wrote here), that’s it’s your pain who modified your perceptions and mind.
For me, if you don’t, you’re just a simple liar, a fucking nasty woman, a white redneck!

So, it’s a kind of “droit de réponse”, and I want a strong public “sorry” for what you did to Anna.

2. I know you’ve been raped, because you yielded about that this Thursday (Anna never tell stories about your life or your life together, Margaret; because she respects you – but I guess there too, you won’t believe me – or her and I just hate that you don’t trust her as she trusts you), trying to hurt her very badly, saying she was worse that the rape you experienced. Ouch !!! That’s the main raison I want to write the truth.

(I’m not happy to tell here that story on your blog – it’s so personal. I’m even very sad that I have to write you that – but I can’t talk to you, you wouldn’t let me talk, as it seems to me that you like to have power on people.
But as you used it to hurt Anna, and, SIC, in public, and in French, so nobody could understand but us – and it seems to me that you’re not so shy (and you don’t respect her and your common love story with her) to tell to everybody Anna’s personal life or rubbishes on her, but not your own personal stuffs, especially when it’s so unfair, low and pervert!

And you use that kind of techniques, so she can’t talk after that, you do it in a way other people can’t understand – that’s why I say you’re a pervert, Margaret. You call her freaks? You call her a monster? Ho, it’s true, you’re so clean and so franc!

So… I thought, finally, it would be fair that I translate that part of your French sentences, anyway… even if I think it’s bad to do it…)

I’ve been raped too, when I was 12 (and not just once…). And I worked on it, for quite a long time, with a psyanalyse.

As a woman (feminist and older than you), I wanted to tell you that I see in your acts (and way of speaking) many on theses traumas. Sure, your violent way of being (and violent speech) comes from violence you had suffered – but remember that she is not the one who hurted you.

You project a lot of stuff on her, because she’s not far from your intimity, and you’re frightened by personal relationship, denying a lot of things, ok... it’s better to be a butcher than a victim; but on an other hand, you’re want everybody here think you’re a victim, you talk a lot – she doesn’t - and you say she is the bloody drunk butcher, and in a very bad manner – so bad I need to tell the truth afterward.

Please, Margaret, stop living in your own fantasies and nightmares – it’s not a solution for yourself I think, and it’s so painful for Anna, please believe me. Be courageous and strong for (you and) her, and try to search the truth, talk to her, and try to listen to her (later if you can’t right now). I can imagine now (I know about your rape, since this Thursday you told us you will commit suicide if I don't leave) how you’re suffering, but forget for a while your “belly button”, try to see her feelings, try to make peace with Anna! Please! For her… and for you too.

I dare write “belly button” because since now Anna read this letter, she told me you are use to say that kind of stuffs, that everybody here know you're an actor, who like that kind of effet.
I didn't know that before today. For me, it's just crazy and so easy to try to shut me up that way. But now I know - so I will not be so careful with you anymore, because I belived you the day you told that!
In France, we tell: how use to shout "there's a wolf here", nobody will never believe anymore that person, even if a day there's really a wolf here.

Anna tried and still tries to “take” that, I mean she understand that your violence is coming from there, and doesn’t fight back when you’re so horrible and violent. But for me, (and I know I’m not alone to think that, because several people told me that, here) it’s not an excuse for what I can guess you did to her. Because when I heard you this Thursday, what you can say (and how!!!) I can imagine how bad you can be in bad days – she never talks about you, because that’s private stories, you and her, in private, when you were together. Maybe that’s why she doesn’t want to argue when you’re so unfair? It’s not because you are right, Margaret! It’s because she (still) tries to protect you, and I think she shouldn’t!
Your story doesn’t allow you to write wrong and unfair stuffs on her, here on your blog or to people! It’s a bad idea, and you could experiment bad stories if you do that, with somebody else, not gentle as she is, see?

Working on rape with a good analyst could help you, and specially learn a little bit how to protect your partner from the trauma (even if it’s not easy, I know that).

- Question: Why this letter?

Answers:

Cause you don't want to listen! So I have to write…

You came crying and yielding, the Thursday 13th September in the evening, while several people of alpha were there.

If I say something, you just say I lie – it’s so easy!

The only thing you wanted to hear was “I’m sorry Margaret”, but after that, you told such horrible things that I couldn’t talk anymore!

After what you told us, I just couldn’t stand staying here in alpha (it was really hard for me to be here, but after your intervention, it was really worse)! Nobody tried to stop you, I understand why – the worse is I think nobody here could really talk with you, even later, because they just fear you, I guess!

But I must tell it’s nice that you recon you had read some Anna's mails on her computer, so… thanks! Because 1st, that's very rude and intrusive, and 2nd, it's telling a lot about you!

I mean, if you want somebody to trust you and be honest with you, you have to be fair and honest with that person, you have to trust her. And the same for respect: you ask for respect… but I say that to be respected, you have to respect the “Other”!

Speech can be very powerful – think about that !

This Thursday, you asked me to quit alpha, and I did it, the day after – as I told you, even if Anna didn’t agree. And the Friday, we camp in the Embassy Tent in Victoria Park, then came with Anna in some backpackers – to feel better cause I was quite perturbed, AND to let you some more space – and then I travelled, I just came back the 15th October.

You say I don’t care about you. It’s not the truth, see? Because Anna loves you, so I care about you! (I guess you don’t care about how I feel, I just want you to know I was here to support Anna, not that I wanted you freak out – I want her to feel better, so you both could talk – it’s important for her).

Since I’m here, I used to smoke not in the garden, but in the street – ask people! Even if you told Anna, before I took my plane ticket, I could come in the garden, I tried not to do it, I keep Anna’s room most of the day, alone, because I didn’t want to perturb you.
I agree with you that Anna should leave you last year. And I told her, at that time, than she should move from Alpha. But since this Thurday, she explain to me she doesn’t want you to give orders to her, as you were used to do with her, that she was wrong to let you "walk on her face" and insult her the way you’re used to do – since this Thursday, I can understand what she was talking about, not before !

You acknowledged you talk with Anna of my travel here (before I came in australia), because you even said I could film your divorce, remember? So you just told to everybody that you were okay for I come here, that you were ok I could walk through the garden and public space here.

I always watched if you were there – but some time, as you are a great actor and dress differently, I just could not recognise you! (I think of Lise’s gig)
Why you didn’t came to say to somebody you don’t want me here?

You don’t believe me when I tell you we didn’t have sex before Anna came in France, in june 2006.

Do you remember Damaris? She was my girlfriend when you came to France, and she was living in my flat, because she didn’t have money to have one. Do you think I could go out with Anna, with her in my flat? No! But it’s so easy for you to tell I’m a nasty girl and to think and say I lye…

Later, I quit my flat, because I’ve got a lot of good friends, not her – she was a foreign student in France.

You think you’re the one who can live in alpha, that Anna was your guest, so she has to leave alpha. But I think now she paid her rent for many years, she worked a lot or the community. But you’re so violent, Margaret, that I guess nobody here would like to say you she has the right to live here!

I know too that a night, last year, you woke her in the middle of the night, she could not fall asleep again. You were with your girlfriend, while Anna was still living in the 7. She was feeling so bad that she called me – you were so drunk and made so much noise that I could here you two, laughing in the bathroom!
And then you come say us we are cruel because sometime we’re laughing in the 11, another house? Nobody can tell you you’re cruel, like nobody want to talk to Jasmine, Margaret! Do you want people think you’ll become like Jasmine?
Maybe you should tell Anna “I’m sorry about that, I should not do that kind of stuff and give later, in public, a moral lesson to you, Anna, because I’m not a saint!!!!”

If Anna says she's desesperate and feel really bad, about how it's going with you 2 now, you just say "bullshit". And you tell us that you knows better than her what she thinks and how she feels! And that's a very bad form of totalitarism - I can't let you say that! *

It's so easy to attack someone who doesn't fight back. You write rubbishes on your blog, cry and shout with a lot of people from Alpha, on your PRIVATE relationship and love story - only the way it's nice for you, the facts you like, who show to other you’re right and she is wrong. She doesn't do that, she won't do that.
I would like to know why you do that!

I guess maybe you do that, so people here will think you're the victim? But moreover, this sad Thursday before I left alpha, you yield about very personal and sad stuff in your life, in French, so other people can’t understand – but I did, and then, I was so shocked and angry about what you said! You just trying to hurt her very badly – but people here can’t understand how bad and strong these insults were!!! It’s so unfair, I can’t leave your country without speak about that!

I write you too, because I remembered afterward it’s true (see, I recon you were right and I was wrong!) one day I read your blog, I think it was maybe last year, I was in France. And I told you this Thursday I didn’t.

One time only, because I don’t like to read such rubbishes! Yes, I’m writing “rubbishes”, because it was full of rubbish on me and my family.

You talked about colonialism, racism and fascism in your blog (it’s what I remember, I don’t want to get there to read it again, and maybe you changed it since last year), and that you couldn’t understand why Anna loved me, as she’s half Arab from Algeria and I’m a fascist.
What do you know about that? It’s not your culture, it’s much more ours! Ho, I forgot: as a white middle class ozi woman, you know better than us!

Who do you think you are, to feel free of writing that kind of rubbish on your blog? How can you think I’d like to read it again, or that I care what you can write here (or now, that I could care about what you can think and tell about me?)?

At that time, I thought maybe you didn’t understand correctly French (I use to keep doubt with non-french-speaking people’s words and thoughts), so, I talked with Anna about that, and then I forgot it, even when she told me you were quite good in French – without saying bad stuff on you, Margaret. Because thanks, Anna is a really good person, not as you!

22h: I even think now you don't have a real true friend. Because if you had, that person should have told you that you are unfair with Anna, that you came too far. Could you hear that? And you tell so much lies, and she's just so alone here, it's like you broke relationships she could have here, with your lies?
I hope I'm wrong, Margaret!

But now I know you better, the only answers I can find (I hope I’m wrong, I would like you explain this to me) are :

1- you’re a white Australian, and you not feel easy with the story of your country with aboriginal people here – good on you, but bad way to deal with it! Why would you want people here think I’m a fascist, and that we are some really bad persons?

* You call her an alcoholic. But when she’s with me, she doesn’t drink! Only when she was with you, of after you split – and you were so bad with her!

* You call her lazy. But she’s always working!

* You say Anna always think to the sex? And what are you painting and always talk about, Margaret?

It’s exactly what white middle class ozi use to say about aboriginal people, Margaret! White ozi and American use to project the things they don’t want to see about themselves on black people!

Work on that!

If you need, as I know you say I lye, I can send you some names of book about that?

2- your centre in life is your belly-button, and you can’t imagine it’s NOT the centre of other people life – mine, in this case?

You know, if I wanted, I could get you in court for these? But I won’t, cause I think to Anna. And I have better to do, too ;)

*
for your health – and then for hers, cause I love her and I’d like you 2 could talk.

Once again, you talk too much, Margaret (too much lies, I mean)… be careful, there’s much more evil people on earth but Anna and me ;)

But right now, if rather think that you just transform the reality, to fit your "dreams" (it's much more nightmares). Stop hurt yourself using us.

Wake up, Margaret, maybe it’s not too late.

Jenny"

Freeberberman, mate...

2007-09-22T15:17:00.000+10:00

31 Australian people appeal to their Minister of Immigration,Kevin Andrews, for him to grant a visa to Mohand Limani, democrat threatened in Algeria, and his fellow sportsman Mourad Tifrani.
Mohand is a wood-carver and taekwondo teacher; he carves traditional Berber motives on wood; he's thus reinventing a millenary artisanal tradition, requiring a patience and precision he excels in, with a contemporary artistic touch linked to his own sensitivy. Some pieces are purely ornamental, others become precious pieces of furniture. Indeed, Mohand's art reflects a mastery of both the hand and spirit he also puts in practice in taekwondo, a martial art of which he's an international champion.

PetitionMohand
envoyé par halfafluff

Am I meant to...

2007-09-13T20:50:00.000+10:00

Am I meant to tell Sch. Scr. that her favorite lecturer's hair at NAS is ready for the crop and if she went and visited him there right next Tuesday, he'd beam with pleasure if she thought of it? Probably not because I don't think she wants to talk to me before a (big) while. But I tell her all the same, hopefully she won't take it as stalking in the wind....

Hope she's all right. I don't even know if she's still into hair and merkens....

Boooties Up For Sandon Point

2007-08-26T20:28:00.000+10:00

... yes, Boooties with 3 o's, for Oz.

Saturday arvo, we went with a couple of misfits and cheerrorists to Sandon Point, to show our bare indignation to the project of Frank Sartor. He's planning to transform Sandon Point, that fine piece of coastline, into a 'village'. No, not a small town as the word meant in the (so old-fashioned, dear) last century, but a quickly built residential suburbia with one road, no, not two, one is enough, not one shop, four-wheel drive is enough to the supermarket, and one station of sewerage treatment, shit is shit is shit is shit.

We bared our bums and protested in the nude against a process dressep up as 'democratic' but can't hide its autocratic pudendae (Latin for genitalia, also Latin). Or should we say totalitarian, since we're into synonyms?.... And what's the difference anyway, hayfever?

Well, in both democracy and dictature, a consultation happens between the government and the concerned people (=demos in ancient Greek). In a democracy (from the aforementioned Greek demos, meaning 'people' and the samely Greek cratia, 'power'), the government's decision depends on the people's. In a totalitarist regime, the government takes decision with no regard to people's opinions and decisions, in the name of an idea, such as 'Let's make money, now!'

Jill Walker has undertaken a court action against the overdevelopment in Sandon Point. To support that champion of a whole community concerns, come and partake the art auction at the Mori Gallery on Saturday 1st of September 2007, starting at 3pm.

At The Vanishing Point

2007-05-27T15:34:00.000+10:00

At The Vanishing Point – Contemporary Art invites you to …

The Floating World Just Got Media Saturated

by Peter McGuiness

Springtime of Salad Days

by Louise Brissenden, Mitra Jovanovic and Simona Jovanovic

Ghost

by Naomi Oliver

May 31 – June 17, 2007

Opening launch Thursday May 31, 6pm-9pm.

565 King Street Newtown

Following the huge success of the gallery’s opening season, At The Vanishing Point – Contemporary Art kicks off its winter exhibition program with three new shows that explore notions of femininity, emotion, materiality and the media through the use of installation, object making, collage and video production in a colourful and playful yet often profoundly serious display.

Marrickville artist and filmmaker, Peter McGuiness brings us ‘The Floating World Just Got Media-Saturated’; large scale collaged paintings exploring contemporary cultural, environmental and spiritual concerns. These paintings – or lan(guage)scapes - employ ripped-out headlines from the Sydney Morning Herald and other community newspapers. The artworks subvert the original context and meaning of the headlines to bring new de-contextualised symbolism, requiring a reinterpretation through the juxtaposition of the headlines and other imagery that evoke politically charged

re-relationships. McGuiness’s work is an amalgamation of the genres of appropriation art and abstract landscape painting. He is influenced by such artists as Imants Tillers and Rosalie Gascoigne, two of Australia’s prominent artists of the late 20^th Century.

Newtown emerging artists Mitra and Simona Jovanovic join Louise Brissenden in a collaborative installation titled ‘Springtime of Salad Days’. The trio explore issues of femininity, isolation and rebellion through the potentiality of fabric and children’s art and craft materials. Employing playfulness and the use of vivid colour in their object making, assemblages and childlike portraits, the use of such mechanisms highlight the complex relationships and paradoxes as the artists tackle searching issues to do with contemporary being, femineity and youth in the technological age.

Blue Mountains artist Naomi Oliver’s exhibition ‘Ghosttrain’ is a video work that addresses the artist’s interest in public displays of emotion, especially when expressed out of context. Ghosttrain is part of Oliver’s on-going exploration of the social taboos surrounding not only the expression of certain emotions, but particularly the public demonstration of them, where there is a blurring of the zones of comfort and discomfort for both the performer and the audience. Come and see this fascinating work as Oliver re-lives the Luna Park Ghost Train ride that she encountered so distressingly in her childhood.

As part of the exhibition the gallery will be holding a children’s Collage and Self Portrait Workshop, where participants will make self portraits using cut-outs from magazines, newspapers, reverse garbage, paint, pastel and pencil. Cost $10 each child, materials supplied. Suitable for ages 5-12 years. Saturday 16^th June 1pm-3pm. Bookings essential (02) 9519 2340.

Also on Saturday 16^th June there will be a free Guided Tour and Artist Floor Talks from 3pm-4pm. All Welcome.

Gallery hours Wed-Fri 10am-6pm, Sat-Sun 10am-4pm

(or by appointment). Entry is free. All are welcome.

Regards,

Brendan Penzer
ATVP - Contemporary Art
565 King Street
Newtown NSW 2042
(02) 95192340
0430 083 364

www.atthevanishingpoint.com.au

Recycling is the way to be!

2007-05-26T13:30:00.000+10:00

Julie Paterson
Common Ground
Opening Saturday 2nd June 5-7pm
Until 23rd June
Sheffer Gallery
38 Lander St, Darlington 2008 Sydney

HUNGER STRIKE AT VILLAWOOD

2007-05-20T16:53:00.000+10:00

Further to Ian's media release. We've just heard that Ms Yuan started to eat yesterday (Fri) afternoon. This means that there is one male asylum seeker left on hunger strike (now 54 days). He is still in stage 2 at Villawood. We are investigating further ways to get publicity for his situation in order to pressure the minister.

Mark

ps: a reminder that NSW RAC is currently meeting on the first Monday of the month, 6pm at the Teachers Federation (23 Mary St, Surry Hills). Next meeting will be Mon 5 June.

Ian Rintoul wrote:

Dear All,
Below is the press release for the 50th day of the Villawood hunger strike.
It is now 53 days. The situation is just the same. We have no further
information about Ms Yuan being force fed. I have been able to confirm that the Chinese man in Stage 1 (who was transferred from Baxter) came off hunger strike four days ago.

I will paste in Kevin Andrews contact details if people can phone or fax his office to urge him to act in this matter, that would be appreciated.

Ian

MEDIA RELEASE

50 DAYS: REFUGEE SUPPORTERS HOLD VIGIL FOR VILLAWOOD HUNGER STRIKE

Refugee supporters will hold a protest vigil outside the Department of
Immigration office, 26 Lee Street, Sydney, from 4.00pm-5.30pm to mark the 50th day of the hunger strike by two Chinese asylum seekers in Villawood detention centre.

The strike began on 28 March following the deportation of Chinese asylum seeker. There are grave fears concerning the welfare of the hunger strikers.
Ms Yuan has been in hospital for over two weeks but is still refusing food.
She suffered kidney problems after only two weeks into the hunger strike.

Reports from the hospital a few days ago indicated that Immigration may be planning to force-feed Ms Yuan.

The Refugee Action Coalition understands that Ms Yuan would have to be determined to be “incompetent” before such a step could be taken. There are strict ethical guidelines for doctors intervening in political protests.

Villawood management is now refusing to allow other detainees to visit the hunger strikers.

“W are pleading with the Minister to urgently intervene to review the cases
of people at Villawood. The fate of these people is in the Ministers hands.
Chinese asylum seekers have said they would rather die here than at the
hands of the Chinese authorities,” aid Ian Rintoul, spokesperson for the
Refugee Action Coalition.

“Australia has a responsibility not to send asylum seekers anywhere they may face persecution. The hunger strikers have consistently asked for the Minister to end the forced deportations to China or anywhere else, yet the Minister has forcibly deported at least four people to China while the hunger strike has been on.”

“The government promised a different Immigration department following the revelations of Cornelia Rau and Vivian Solon,” said Ian Rintoul, “but Kevin Andrews has taken the department back to the punitive days of Philip Ruddock. The Minister has behaved recklessly with the lives of those who are supposed to be in his care.”

“We do not want to see a tragedy in Villawood. These people may already have suffered permanent damage to their health on top of the suffering of the months and years of detention.”

For more information contact: Ian Rintoul 0417 275 713

Kevin Andrews: Please phone or send a fax to Immigration Minister Kevin
Andrews (ph 6277 7860; fax 6273 4144) expressing your concern for the people
on hunger strike and urging him to act to end the forced deportations and
announcing a review of the asylum cases and long-term detention. In 2005,
the government promised that long-term detention would be ended but people
are still behind the wire in Villawood for up to 4 years.

Australia has an obligation under the Refugee Convention not to return
asylum seekers anywhere they may face danger. The record of human rights
abuses by the Chinese authorities is well known. The hunger strikers are
demanding that the government follow up those who have been deported to make
sure that they are safe.

EXHIBITIONS

2007-05-12T10:50:00.000+10:00

Alpha House Sketch-Club will hold its annual show for a week, from Saturday 26th of May to Sunday 3rd of June 2007. Exhibition opened on Saturday 26th of May, 6to 8 pm, then visit on appointment only, contact person Andrew, 0411 88 45 43.

The May Show at the Mori Gallery, running from Wednesday 9th to Saturday 26th May 2007, comprises Giles Alexander, Matt and Greer Rochford, Erika Harrison and Anna Belhalfaoui. Willurei Kirkbright-Burney, who should have been part of the show, had an accident and couldn't make it. Best wishes for her convalescence.
Giles is presenting exquisitely distorted big format paintings of interior churches in subtels hues of sepia and black and white photographic quality, sometimes agrementad of a big random stain of blue or pink, as in an iconoclastic gesture;
Erika is showing magnificent aerial views of salt lakes from the Northern Territories, format 84x120 cm: it gives you space for a desert dream - so beautiful when you're not stuck in the middle of it!
Matt and Greer have installed a small dark room in between the inner and outer space of the gallery and offer us a direct insight on the inside as well as a audio and video invitation to critically look at the image.
Anna has drawn 52 countries outlines, then drawn a funny face in each on a background of grid reminding of the parallel and meridian system the earth is mapped with; each one is monochromatic, but they're all hanged in a narrow corridor allowing a close view of the humanoid features and a colourful patchwork effect reminding us that the world is above all made of diversity.

For Solomon Island

2007-04-16T13:50:00.000+10:00

Hello,

Hope to see you at the SOLOMON ISLANDS FUNDRAISER -

COCKTAIL PARTY + ART AUCTION next wed 18th April.

VENUE: RAIA (Royal Australian Institute Architects) 3 Manning St, Potts Point

WHEN: 6.30 -9PM WED 18TH APRIL
MUSIC: Foreign Heights (MC Trey, Maya Jupiter and DJ Nick Toth)

TICKETS: $20

Back!

2007-03-25T21:51:00.000+10:00

Building Our Very Own Guantanamo Bay Prison On Christmas Island…

A public meeting presented by the Refugee Action Collective, Asylum Seeker Resource Centre and Christian World Service (Vic) National Council of Churches.

...800 beds (includes a children’s compound). $360 million. Proposed opening: mid 2007...

Find out about Australia’s secretive new high security prison for refugees.

It’s being built right now, 1000kms off the Australian mainland. …Where no one can hear you scream.

7pm, Wednesday 28 March

RMIT Kaleide Theatre. 360 Swanston St Melbourne.

Featuring:

• Julian Burnside QC, refugee and human rights advocate

• Guy Coffey, Foundation House - Victorian Foundation for the Survivors of Torture

• Sister Brigid Arthur, Brigidine Sisters Asylum Seeker Project

• Anna Samson, NSW refugee advocate, recently returned from Christmas Island

ACT NOW

Download a copy of the petition demanding an immediate halt to construction of the facility - visit www.rac-vic. org. Please collect as many signatures as possible, and return to RAC by May 31.

Join the fight for justice for refugees - the Refugee Action Collective meets at 6pm on the 1st & 3rd Tuesday of each month @ Trades Hall (cnr Lygon and Victoria Sts). e:refugeeaction@ hotmail.com p: 0438 399 973

Hi all,
> just a quick spam to let you all know about two
> projects i'm involved at the
> moment.
> One is a residency in Bundanon (arthur Boyd's) where
> i'm focusing on weeds
> and blogs (see www.weedyconnection .com/blog )
> the other is a show i'm part of in Newtown,
> AtTheVanishingPoint -the show to
> launch the space.
>
> the blog you can visit anytime, pplease do n
> comment, an the show is going
> to open on Thursday 5th of April, 6-8pm, 565 king
> st, newtown.
>
> here's the flier:
>
http://farm1. static.flickr. com/150/42981027 2_6233d8e0bd_ b.jpg
>
> hope to see you all, online or onlive
> cheers,
> nbdy
>
>
> www.weedyconnection .com/blog
> www.weedyconnection .com
> www.squatspace. com
> www.nobodys. Info

You are invited to attend the opening of gaffa's re-launch show

Where to...?

Opening Thursday 5th April 6-10pm
(Exhibition runs until the 25th)

@New location 1/7 Randle Street
(Corner of Elizabeth and Randle)

The title is a play on words
representing
the recent moving process as

well as the theme for the show which focuses on the on-going discussion

about the relationships between art, design, craft, ornament,

functionality, the original and the infinitely reproducible. The title

poses a question to encourage an open dialogue . The exhibition

features a

group of artists from a diverse range of backgrounds who’s practices

are

concerned with these issues. There will be plenty of innovative and

unique

work to see, as well as being one hell of a house warming!

Artists Include ~ E. Armanious, Ben Pearce, Nicollete Skobier, Sian

Edwards, Emily Hunt, Raquel Welch, Rosary Coloma, Mark Wotherspoon,

Naomi

Waller and David Gustafson

~Curated by Kelly Robson~

~To be opened by Sheridan Kennedy~

.............................................................................

Newly situated just behind Central Station, we remain committed to

providing an accessible creative space for emerging artists in the

inner-city. We accept proposals from artists and designers from all

disciplines and our gallery, with its professional fit-out, can cater

to a

variety of needs.

Our motivation is to provide a platform for new emerging talent - to

nurture an environment in which the artists and the audience can feel

comfortable interacting. Having come from an object based background

ourselves, we are particularly dedicated to raising the profile of this

area which includes the art of glass, metalwork, plastics, ceramics and

more. Object art and design is an area in which so many innovative and

playful things are occurring, but one that is frequently under exposed.

As

well as the main gallery we also have g2 which is our permanent display

section featuring a range of local as well as overseas artists and

designers –a great opportunity to access affordable, new and exciting

work. This collection is updated regularly and many of our artists are

also happy to take custom orders. The g2 collection is a must to be

investigated by those appreciative of quality workmanship and original

design.

Please feel free to browse www.myspace.com/gaffagallery and view

pictures

of our past events, learn about our upcoming exhibitions or find out

how

to submit a proposal

............................................................................

ALSO opening on the 5th 6-8pm

Coast Gardes

A group of artists from New Zealand trained in the art of stone-cutting

Metalab {Studio & Gallery}, 10b Fitzroy Place, Surry Hills

(10 minute walking distance)

www.metalab.com.au

............................................................................

Coming up in May

Make-Off!

An Eclectic Collective of Artists, Makers and Practitioners

~An exhibition by the staff of Object Gallery~ (3rd - 15th)

Artists include: Melinda Young, Michele Morcos, Kristy Toepfer, Gino

Ho,

Phil Young, Amelia Ramsden, Andy Stevenson, Virginia Mayer, Gabe Clark,

Joe, Honor

Freeman, Emily Howes, Kennie Ward, Chantal Sneddon, George Plionis,

Aaron

Seeto

~Profile Week: Edition 5~ (17 - 29th)

Showcasing our very own local emerging artists and designers

..............................................................................

June

~Ecology Matters~

Bevan Dally, Rachel Carroll, Leonel Sanchez Sanchez, Steve Lewis, Soma

Garner, Sam Glasheen

This exhibition combines the work of six Sydney artists, each exploring

their ideas, philosophies and experiences related to ecology. Including

sculpture, drawing, painting and photography. The theme of ecology is

surmised as “(the study of) the pattern of relations of plants, animals

and people to each other and to their surrounds”

~Glass Art & Design~

Six leading industrial designers and glass artists come together to

present their take on the medium of glass.

Adam Goodrum, Trent Jansen, John Baskett, Nick Karlovasitis, Sarah

Gibson

and Andrew Simpson

.............................................................................

July

~ Mutation & Imagination ~ Solo exhibition by Claude Jones

Returning from a Postgraduate Exchange at the Nova Scotia College of

Art

and Design in Canada, Claude's solo show - Mutation & Imagination

explores

the potential transcendence of the monstrous to the marvelous, the

grotesque to the sublime.

.............................................................................

August

~To Have and to Hold~

Luiza Milewicz, Nicole Bannerman, Sylvie Markovina

To Have & To Hold is an exhibition that explores the handbag from the

perspective of a jewellery object rather than being limited solely to

its

conventional connotation as a fashion accessory.  The handbag is a

portable container for all of the ephemera of private and public life,

and

so its significance is determined also by its contents.  Three

contemporary artists bring together their individual styles to

interpret

the handbag and its contents as reflected by their backgrounds in

jewellery and fashion.

.............................................................................

Please stay tuned for further 07 program details

~This project has been assisted by the Australian Government through

the

Australian Council for the Arts, its arts funding and advisory body~

*We like to hope this information is valued. If you are recieving this

news in error please reply with a "no thanks" in the subject line

--

gaffa

7 Randle Street

Surry Hills

NSW 2010

www.gaffa.com.au

www.myspace.com/gaffagallery

et si...

2007-02-24T19:31:00.002+11:00

sheepie or chipie

2007-02-24T19:31:00.001+11:00

Profile Week4 @ Gaffa

2007-01-25T21:25:00.000+11:00

Opening night drinks @ gaffa

THursday 1st of February 6-8pm

:::PROFILE WEEK: Edition 4:::

gaffa's 4th profile week features artists from a diverse
range of backgrounds. From Darren Wigley's striking
abstractive photography concerning

"Control, accidents and visual contamination"

,to the touching and transient work of Ravi Prasad, 
'Love Letters' left randomly around the city
for passers by to read.

"It was an invitation to consider, for a moment, that a person, like

me,

could exist in the world. That someone out there was prepared to write

love letters for someone else, for free."

Claude Jones(invite image)exhibits drawing and objects using imagery,

simultaneously alien and familiar, confronts the audience through the

combination of what is recognizable to the human anatomy and what is

fantasy.

"My imagery centers on the re-visioning of the human body in an age of

increasingly visible and accessible biotechnology and cosmetic surgery

practices."

Also not to be missed, work by contemporary fashion jeweller Jasmine

Laing

- 'Play-Me' de-conconstructed and then reconstructed guitar components

by

Jessica Paige - 'Bonds, mutations and mechanisms' by Cecile Kym crafted

from resin and silver, reminiscent of human bone structures.

Plenty of food for thought

Braille @ 4A

2007-01-18T20:31:00.000+11:00

You are invited to touch/feel/hear...
Braille window project
work  in progress
Friday 19th January 2007, 6:30-8:30pm
A hybrid arts project devised
by Anne Walton and Bruce Maguire
in collaboration with gallery 4a,
adults and children who read
and write braille, and passers-by.
This research and development project
has been made possible
with the generous assistance
of the City of Sydney.
City of Sydney logo.
Arts NSW logo.
Ozco logo.
Asia-Australia Arts Centre logo.
Asia-Australia Arts Centre
Gallery 4a
181-187 Hay St Sydney
02 9212 0380
info@4a.com.au
www.4a.com.au

Image description: Video still, close-up of three fingers reading
transparent
braille text, seen through Gallery 4a window. Video still courtesy Anne
Walton.
ASIA-AUSTRALIA ARTS CENTRE
181-187 Hay Street
Sydney NSW 2000

Open Tuesday-Saturday, 11am-6pm
Closed Public holidays
Tel: + 61 2 9212 0380
Fax: + 61 2 9281 0873
info@4a.com.au
www.4a.com.au

A Pure Dadaist Moment

2007-01-15T20:31:00.000+11:00

... You usually enjoy a lot of non-sense moments on the net, but they seem to make sense in spite of all, hey? Well, this one is a pure and unashamed combination of letters that do not make sense. Better than a Pascalian martingale.

Ballers mbmattafix, mbmauro picotto, komodo mbmax, graham yesi owner!
Breaks paragraphs converted use tags shown public sites.
Coveragi virgin mbguano apes dodel lords boards, speech scarlet!
Fault mbfergie mbferry corsten, mbfields? Wwf promo wicked clowns.
Pendulum, hultsfred sweden theatro.
Absolute antimusic blanktv, ideas bosh bossip breakfast tiffanys!
Sweetness mbjoan osborne mbjoey ramone wonderful. Mbtexas mbthe betty
brandon damour devils. Obsessed, intv, charltons jossip juicy. Weare
clue iggy sum ludacris rhythms plus. Imago dresden dionysos buch?
Pt wait claymation eeyore purity sids solo joeys iowa.
Sugar mbfantasy mbfatboy pray gangster tripping. Bussines cleaning
closet guilty.
Cruz served, host syndicated name adventure diving.
Fijneman, jan johnston hs nil, xmode ameno bellissima. Mbbran
drinking, mbbrandy, kanye west talk mbbrian? Herself, saying bum bon
at. Lifeforce mysteria behind curtains entrance conceiled progenies
apocalypse? Letters jmmey, simple worms mbfinger eleven mbfive dance!
Drunkship lanterns ballroom inertiatic, esp?
Avrils cut basket case premios ondas tell.
Backwash, candy grind breaker, tuna wiretap.
Busta ante mbmorbid blessed enshrined slime, ace spades! Messed epk
amanda bunkface cutting backstage voo doo?
French kissing lachlan vaughn adam freeland, freelander, mbsash
adelante? Weed pathetic pants exist, mutt country mbblondie.
Stripped nyc mya marmalade. Tina cousins mysterious timesmpg,
mbsavage mbsaves!
If, pissed revenge such candids, rocker pal services exhubby. Miu
piujustin aroundmoby dream videopop nosh. China, mbmoloko indigo
flipside mbmolotov mundo. Justin mmc michael jackson las vegas
mbbrooklyn bounce.
Ama spanish radio edit slave.
Durst, tilt kim redman. Needled silent sixpounder wacken trashed.
Piggy pie tiltawhirl mbinterpol? Upcoming rikki pig adaptation
classic richard. Mbpowerman, bombshell relax vigilante.
Dangelo ups mbmethods mayhem mbmichael.
Ms megamix fa faustao russian roulette, alexia.
Anderson mbtoni braxton mbtool aenima parabola.

Wot's going on at Gaffa,Mori Gallery, and a couple of others?

2007-01-15T20:11:00.000+11:00

Happy New Year! You are invited to attend Gaffa's first exhibition
opening
for 2007


:::Slow Mapping:::

Opening Thursday 18th January 6-8pm
runs until Jan 30th

An exhibition of sound, video and
installation art by Pmfk and Sam
Doctor








Oliver Ressler in Australia
>
>
> Oliver Ressler, Austrian artist and co-director (with Dario
Azzellini)
> of "5 Factories-Worker Control in Venezuela," will be in Australia in
> January. Come to a special screening of his film followed by a
> discussion with the artist.
>
>  Melbourne: Jan 25th Trade's Hall, 6pm, phone 0431 260 787
>  Sydney: Jan 29th, 6pm, Mori Gallery, 168 Day St, Sydney
>
> Entry is free but donations are welcomed to the Venezuelan solidarity
> groups who will be present on the night. Sponsored by the Bolivarian
> Circle and the Australian Venezuela Solidarity Network.
>
> 5 Factories-Worker Control in Venezuela:
>
> In their second film regarding political and social change in
> Venezuela, after " Venezuela from Below" (67 min., 2004), Dario
> Azzellini and Oliver Ressler focus on the industrial sector. The
> changes in Venezuela's productive sphere are demonstrated with five
> large companies in various regions: a textile company, aluminum
works,
> a tomato factory, a cocoa factory, and a paper factory. In all, the
> workers are struggling for different forms of co- or self-management
> supported by credits from the government. "The assembly is basically
> governing the company", says Rigoberto López from the textile factory
> "Textileros del Táchira" in front of steaming tubs. And coning
machine
> operator Carmen Ortiz summarizes t
he experience as follows: "Working
> collectively is much better than
working for another–working for
> another is like being a slave to that other".
>
> The protagonists portrayed at the five
production locations present
> insights into ways of alternative
organizing and models of workers'
> control. Mechanisms and difficulties
of self-organization are
> explained as well as the production
processes. The portrayal of
> machine processes could be seen as
a metaphor for the dream machine
of
> the "Bolivarian process", and the hopes and desires it inspires among
> the workers. The situation in the five factories varies, but they
> share the common search for better models of production and life.
This
> not only means concrete improvements for the workers. Aury Arocha,
> laboratory analyst at the ketchup factory "Tomates Guárico",
> emphasizes that the difference between "social production companies"
> (EPS) and capitalist corporations is that the EPS "work for the
> community and society". Carlos Lanz, president of the second largest
> aluminum factory in Venezuela, Alcasa, coins the key question: "How
> does a company push toward socialism within a capitalist framework?"
>
> The film ends with an extended sequence from a management meeting at
> Alcasa, a company with 2,700 workers, with discussions about
> co-management and the changes of production relations they aspire
> towards.
>
> The film is originally in Spanish and available with German or
English.

 If You See Something Say Something
>
>  Exhibition, workshop and newspaper
project, January/February 2007
>
>
>
> Over January/February an exhibition,
discussion and newspaper project> will
be held in several venues in Sydney
and Melbourne. Eight> international
and eight Australian artists will be
contributing> artworks, articles and
ideas for  If you see something, say
something> which will explore another
side to the debate on "terrorism". The> contributions range from the very s
ad and serious to the more humorous> or whimsical, as artists  see and say
something very different to the
> vision of the world promoted by the government. Rather than viewing
> those around us with fear and suspicion the artists invite the viewer
> to engage with the world around them and challenge their
understanding
> of the causes of violence and war.
>
>
>
> Al Fadhil (Iraqi artist living in Europe), in a collaborative work
> with his brother Ahmed, who was tragically killed by the invasion of
> Iraq, sends a letter home to his parents as they are uprooted and
> displaced by the war that is engulfing their homeland. The images of
> his families belongings, packed into boxes, are a reminder of how
> temporary and fragile life has become in a war zone.
>
>
>
> Grupo Etcétera… (Argentina), and the spin off collective the Errorist
> International, exhibit a video of their "war on errorism" in a
humours
> look at how the "war on terrorism" has impacted on freedom and civil
> liberties.
>
>
>
> Hito Steyerl (Germany) explores the connections between the Kurdish
> liberation movement and Western governments in her film November.
> November is the period of retreat after the revolution of October,
her
> film explores questions of social responsibility, agency and
violence.
>
>
>
> Contra Filé (Brazil) initiate a "Program for the Deturnstilisation of
> Life Itself." The turnstile is a key symbol in Brazilian society
> regulating access to public transport, education and public buildings
> to those with the money to pay. Their artwork sparked protests which
> culminated in students tearing out and setting fire to turnstiles
> outside the university. The initial artwork and
protests are> documented through photographs and
press clippings.
>
>
>
> Oliver Ressler (Austria) and Dario Azzellini's
(Italy) feature length> documentary 5 Factories
Workers Control in Venezuela explores the> process
of social change in Venezuela under President Hugo
 Chavez.
> Venezuela is providing an example of different
model of development> for the Latin American region
and presents a challenge to US hegemony> in their
"backyard".
>
>
>
> With nuclear power being promoted as the "clean" a
lterative to fossil> fuels Taring Padi (Indonesia) create an installation
which exploresthe consequences of a nuclear accident on the populated and
> geologically unstable islands of Indonesia.
>
>
>
> Closer to home Daniel Boyd turns his eyes towards the displacement of
> Aboriginal people and the acts of violence which have constituted the
> basis for the establishment of Australia through a series of oil
> paintings.
>
>
>
> SquatSpace take viewers on a tour of Redfern/Waterloo as they try and
> comprehend the changes planned for this important and contested inner
> city suburb of Sydney and continue their research of this issue
> through a social mapping project.
>
>
>
> pvi collective take a satirical look at what it would be like if we
> actually tried to enforce all the laws surrounding public space
> through the loyal citizen's underground ( l.c.u). The l.c.u has been
> out and about in Perth challenging people who jay-walk, swear or
break
> any minor laws in public.
>
>
>
> Astra Howard exhibits her walking story booth which encourages people
> to talk about their lives and overcome their fear of "strangers."
>
>
>
> The exhibition and newspaper will be launched January 26th at Gallery
> 4a. Etcétera, Contra Filé, Oliver Ressler and Taring Padi will be in
> Australia for the exhibition.
>
>
>
> A program of events follows.
>
>
>
> For more information or interviews with the artists contact Zanny
Begg
> 0421 420 420 or Keg de Souza 0412 920 044 .
>
>
>
> If You See Something Say Something
>
>  Exhibition, workshops and newspaper project, January/February 2007
>
>
>
> Project initiators: Keg de Souza and Zanny Begg
>
>
>
> Participating artists:
>
>
>
> Dmitry Vilenksy/Chto Delat? (Russia)
>
>  Contra Filé (Brazil)
>
>  Etcétera (Argentina)
>
>  Oliver Ressler (Austria) & Dario Azzellini (Italy)
>
> Taring Padi (Indonesia)
>
>  Richard DeDomenici (UK)
>
>  Al Fadhil (Iraq)
>
> Hito Steyerl (Germany)
>
>  Arlene TextaQueen (Australia)
>
>  David Griggs (Australia)
>
>  pvi collective (Australia)
>
>  SquatSpace (Australia)
>
>  Daniel Boyd (Australia)
>
>  Astra Howard (Australia)
>
>  Keg de Souza (Australia)
>
> Zanny Begg (Australia)
>
>
>
>  "If you see something say something," was pasted on bus shelters and
> train stations around the world in the wake of the 9/11 bombings
> asking us to view those around us with fear and suspicion. But do we
> see this government sponsored vision of the world or do these
> advertisements move us to say something very different? In the state
> of exception produced by the war on terror we are asked to accept a
> consensual vision of fear, war, scapegoating and state sponsored
> violence. Yet many are moved to dissent from this.
>
>
>
> Dissensus can mean widespread disagreement, a failure to reach
> consensus or a consensus only among those who dissent. Jaques
Ranciere
> uses the term to describe rare moments of genuine democracy whereby
> new social actors force themselves into the political landscape
> demanding that their voices, which hitherto have been silent, are
> finally heard. While what we consider politics is often a ritualised
> confrontation between opposing parties, armies, or forces, with a
> known set of protocols on how this resolution will play out, a moment
> of dissensus allows a reconfiguration of how we understand the notion
> of politics itself by opening up pre-existing assumptions of social
> agency.
>
>
>
> If you see something, say something will be a discussion, exhibition
> and publishing project in Sydney in February 2007. Principally this
> will revolve around an exhibition that will involve a small number of
> international and Australian artists whose work has explored aspects
> of dissensus – by either questioning prevailing notions of consensus
> or by exploring new possibilities of social agency. Rather than being
> an exhibition of political art this exhibition will aim to question
> how we actually understand the connections between politics and
> aesthetics.
>
>
>
> Venues:
>
>
>
> Mori Gallery: 168 Day St Darling Harbour
>
> Gallery 4a, The Asia-Australia Arts Centre: 181-187 Hay Street Sydney
>
> Chrissie Cotter Gallery: Pidcock St Camperdown
>
>
>
> Events/openings:
>
>
>
> Melbourne:
>
>
>
> Thursday January 25 - Film Screening Oliver Ressler and Dario
> Azzellini's   5 Factories–Worker Control in Venezuela:, 6pm, Trade's
> Hall,  followed by question and answer session with Oliver Ressler.
> Sponsored by the Bolivarian Circle, LASNET and the Australian
> Venezuela Solidarity Network. Phone: 0431 720 787 .
>
>
>
> Sydney:
>
>
>
> Friday January 26 -  Opening: Gallery 4a, 6-8pm, Artists: Daniel
Boyd,
> Hito Steyerl, Oliver Ressler and Dario Azzellini, Dmitry Vilensky,
> David Griggs, Taring Padi and Zanny Begg. Gallery hours 11-6pm
Tuesday
> to Saturday, exhibition runs until February 11. Phone 9212 0380.
>
>
>
> Monday January 29 - Film screening Oliver Ressler and Dario
> Azzellini's   5 Factories–Worker Control in Venezuela.  Mori Gallery,
> film 6pm, followed by talk and question and answer session with
Oliver
> Ressler 7.30pm. Sponsored by the Bolivarian Circle, LASNET and the
> Australian Venezuela Solidarity Committee.
>
>
>
> Monday February 5 - Opening: Chrissie Cotter Gallery: 6-8pm. Artists:
> Contra Filé. Gallery hours 12-6pm Wednesday to Saturday, exhibition
> runs until February 17. Phone 9335 2222.
>
>
>
> Wednesday February 7 - Opening: Mori Gallery: 6-8 pm,. Artists:
Arlene
> TextaQueen, Al Fadhil, Etcétera, Contra Filé, SquatSpace, pvi
> collective, Astra Howard and  Keg de Souza and Zanny Begg.
Performance
> by Justice Yeldham. Gallery hours 11-6pm Wednesday to Saturday,
> exhibition runs until March 3. Phone 9283 2904.
>
>
>
> Saturday February 3 - Workshop with Taring Padi (Indonesian with
> English translation): 3pm, Gallery 4a.
>
>
>
> Saturday February 10 - Workshop with Contra File (Portuguese with
> English translation): Chrissie Cotter Gallery. 2-4pm.
>
>
>
> Sunday February 11 - Workshop with Etcetera (Spanish with English
> Translation): Mori Gallery 2-4pm.
>
>
>
> Saturday February 10 - Closing party: The Chocolate Factory Basement
> 8pm, Organised by Lauren Parker and Supported by Dual Plover.
>
>
>
> Sunday February 18 - Squatfest: The Anti Tropfest Film Fest (text
> "squat" to 0428 477 128  for venue details) www.squatfest.com.
>
>
>
> Saturday 24 February - SquatSpace presents: Redfern-Waterloo Tour of
> Beauty; meet at the top of Little Eveleigh St, Next to Redfern Train
> Station 2pm. www.squatspace.com/redfern.
>
>
>
> Wednesday February 28 - Feedback Session: Is it possible to bring
> political art into the gallery? Thumbs up, thumbs down… a wrap up and
> debrief on  If You See Something Say Something, at Loose Projects
6pm,
> level 2, 168 Day St Darling Harbour.
>
>
>
> With thanks to our sponsors:
>
> NAVA
>
> Marrickville Council
>
> Australia Council for the Arts
>
> Breakdown Press
>
> Bolivarian Circle
>
> Australia Venezuela Solidarity Network
>
> LASNET
>
>
>
> For more information: www.ifyouseesomethingsaysomething.net
>
>
>
>
> --
> http://www.ifyouseesomethingsaysomething.net/ 
> subtitles.

Happy New Fluff with International Scholarships

2007-01-15T19:54:00.000+11:00

after a short holiday, Fluffy's back from the cliffs. Chale, granit, sandstone, no lava yet...

the reentry sounds exciting, and it's already on. Come out of your retreat and join the ones who emits doubts about their teevee and competition networks:

If you're a student and feel like studying abroad, check up the following link:
http://international-scholarships-portal.blogspot.com. there's a wide range of scholarships available, mainly in Asia, north America and Europe, in science, humanities, engineering, etc.

Hey, Students...

2006-12-22T20:01:00.000+11:00

do you want to leave Fluffytown for a while and study abroad, well... overseas, I mean?

Various scholarships info for study abroad, the latest info includes Ambassadorial scholarships, Junior Research Fellowships -Trinity College Cambridge, UK , The International Centre of Excellence in Tourism and Hospitality Education Scholarship – Australia , Swiss scholarships for university studies, CIMO Fellowships – Finland , and AYF Fellowship-JAPAN (2007) , detail at :

http://internationa l-scholarships- portal.blogspot. com/

best,

Trilala.

the Duke at Gaffa

2006-12-01T21:59:00.000+11:00

What's more stimulating than a magazine you don't agree with and can engage with in a polemic without the machine-guns? 
@gaffa

:::DUKE Magazine Debut Issue:::

Launch Party

By Raquel Welch and Emily Hunt

Launching Thursday 7th December 6-9pm

(Exhibition runs until Dec 12)

What is DUKE Magazine?

DUKE Magazine is an Absurd Art /
Thrift Fashion Magazine,

self-published

through a collaboration between
artists Raquel Welch
and Emily Hunt.

The name DUKE Magazine is drawn from
our favourite David
Bowie character

The Thin White Duke and our fixation
with European Royalty.

Inspired by Girls Annuals from the 1970’s and 80’s
in both content and design, DUKE Magazine focuses on
Thrift Culture and the Art of Collecting.

The debut issue includes features on emerging artists
from Sydney and Melbourne, a Warhol-esque look at
celebrity culture, interviews with interesting
characters, thrift fashion dress-ups and style pages,

fotosex novellas and even a centrefold man.

DUKE Magazine says what others don’t dare. It is an offensive and

entertaining journal which delivers it’s message with biting humour and

brutal honesty. A Magazine with an opinion!

Female Voices in Islam

2006-12-01T21:55:00.000+11:00

Wouldn't it be exciting if a woman issued a fatwa against tha author of violence, domestic or political?

Bringing a Female Voice to Islamic Law

Posted by: "Ayu Ratih"

Wed Nov 22, 2006 3:07 pm (PST)

A Bid to Bring the Female Voice to Islamic Law

By Ben Arnold, Staff writer of The Christian Science Monitor

photo: Laying Plans: Muslim women from 25 countries met over
the weekend in New York to talk over plans for an all-female
council that would weigh in with its interpretations of
Islamic law. Melanie Stetson Freeman - Staff

NEW YORK -- For centuries, devout Muslims have looked to the
fatwa - an opinion based on religious reasoning of a learned
individual or committee - for direction on how to resolve
moral dilemmas ranging from the mundane to the sublime. And
for centuries, Muslim women have conceded the ground, for
the most part, to the men who issue these opinions.

That's beginning to change.

Meeting in New York over the weekend, Muslim women from 25
countries began laying groundwork for the first
international all-female council formed to issue fatwas.
Their idea: to ensure that women's perspectives on Islamic
law become part of religious deliberation in the Muslim
world - particularly on issues such as domestic violence,
divorce, and inheritance.

"There's this growing sense on the part of literate Muslim
women ... that there is a vital need for women to confront
the Islamic tradition and to work on a par with men in
interpreting the sources," says Ann Mayer, an expert in
Middle Eastern law at the University of Pennsylvania' s
Wharton School of Business. "Otherwise you end up with a
very sexist bias in the readings."

The number of women officially sanctioned to issue fatwas is
hard to pin down, but certainly tiny. The emergence of such
women, known as muftias, usually makes headlines: A
religious school in India installed three in 2003, and the
Turkish government last year hired two assistant muftias,
its first. Governments and schools try to license who can
issue fatwas, but Islam stipulates only certain
prerequisites, such as knowledge of the Koran and Arabic. As
a result, the ranks of unofficial authorities are deeper and
the barriers to women surmountable.

Whether the opinions of a women's council will carry any
weight, especially in conservative cultures, is another
matter.

Its advent is proving to be controversial even among Muslim
women who share many goals of those launching the council.

"Advancing the idea of reinterpreting the texts has to be
done, but I am totally against this initiative because it
will have negative effects," says Rebab al-Mahdi, a
political scientist at the American University in Cairo. It
will be portrayed as part of "a Western cultural invasion,"
she adds. "This is what conservative clerics always say, and
people listen."

For others, doubt is mingled with hope.

"I share some cynicism, but at the same moment, symbols are
sometimes important," says Pakistani-born Asma Barlas, a
politics professor at Ithaca College in New York and a
prominent advocate of jettisoning what she calls male-
centric and incorrect interpretations of the Koran. "These
little steps, ... even if they don't change anything, do
send a message that women are getting together and trying to
make their voices heard."

The group is also up against the inertia of tradition.
Throughout history, few Muslim women were prominent jurists,
though scholars are uncovering more, including, some say,
Aisha, the prophet Muhammad's wife. Some question whether
much within the religion is open to new interpretation and,
by extension, reform. Others note that fatwas are nonbinding
and may have little effect on civil law and state judgments.

Still, Muslim women have recently brought change by citing
the Koran and other Islamic sources:

• In Malaysia, a group called Sisters in Islam used Koranic
scholarship to rebuff efforts to exclude Muslims from a
domestic-abuse law.

• In Saudi Arabia, an effort this summer to push women
further back at a crowded holy site in Mecca was thwarted
with the help of a female Islamic scholar's arguments.

• In the United States, the forthcoming English translation
of the Koran by a woman, the first ever, finds an alternate
meaning in a verse widely interpreted to give husbands
authority to beat their wives as a last resort.

photo: Midday Prayer: Muslim women take a break from
deliberations on forming the world's first all-female shura
council. It's a controversial plan, even among reform-minded
Muslims. Melanie Stetson Freeman - Staff

The New York gathering, called the Women's Islamic
Initiative in Spirituality and Equity, plans to seat the new
council - perhaps seven members - within a year. Drawn from
diverse schools within Islam, the members will be versed in
Islamic law. The group also plans to give scholarships for
more women to pursue advanced training - open to women in
places like Morocco, Egypt, and Iran - in an effort to
broaden the qualified pool.

"Islam is a religion of law, and it is important to express
the principles of social justice within the framework of
Islamic law," says Daisy Khan, executive director of the
American Society for Muslim Advancement and leader of the
effort. "This is why we need muftias, in order to do that.
Otherwise, it falls on deaf ears."

Traditionally, religious legal authority was local, vested
in muftis and other leaders who attained their status via
government appointment or community esteem. But today's
global communications are challenging that, as more Muslims
seek religious opinions far and wide through the Internet.
The women's council takes advantage of this: Its members
will be in different places, taking questions and conferring
over the Web.

Given this wider marketplace of ideas, the new council's
credibility will be determined by the quality of its legal
reasoning, and whether its logic strikes a chord, say
several scholars and observers.

"There is a sense among many Muslims - particularly, but not
exclusively, women - that Islamic jurists are out of touch,
that their guidance is not adequate to the modern world. And
if this shura council succeeds in bridging that gap, it may
be speaking to an audience that doesn't currently consider
itself bound by the pronouncements of existing groups," says
Kecia Ali, assistant professor of religion at Boston
University.

"But this is going to be a tremendously challenging task
because religious authority, even scholarly authority, has
always been contested," she adds. "It is in matters related
to women, marriage, sexuality that Muslim intellectuals on
both conservative and modernist sides of the spectrum have
chosen to wage their epic battle."

For others, the council has a credibility problem right out
of the gate. "It should not have happened in New York,
because it will set back the agenda of women given the
current political upheaval [over the Iraq war]," says
Mohammad Reda, a Syrian-American Muslim in the Boston area
often sought out for his religious opinions. He supports the
idea that "women should stand up and give their own opinions
on women's issues," but says American efforts to force
change in the Muslim world, as in Iraq, mean reformers now
must avoid links to the US. The New York conference used
money from nongovernmental foundations, some based in the
US.

Conference attendees say a muftia council could prompt wider
support for women's struggles. "The women who we're trying
to help, for them religion is very important," says Zainah
Anwar, head of the Malaysian group Sisters in Islam. "It's
empowering for them to know that their desire to not be
beaten by their husband can actually be justified in the
name of Islam."

Sweet December at Sheffer and Wei-Zen Ho at the Abercrombie Hotel

2006-11-24T21:15:00.000+11:00

salut everybody!

Why am i out of town when it's summer and there's so much good stuff passing by in the sky of FLUFFYTOWN? like:

AT SHEFFER GALLERY
38 Lander St, Darlington Sydney

Sweet December

Sandra Winkworth, Hiromi Ozaki, Paola Talbert.

Opening Saturday December 2nd 5-7pm until 23rd Dec

...and like:

Who: Wei-Zen Ho, just back from overseas
Where: Abercrombie Hotel, cnr Broadway and Abercrombie St Ultimo
When: Every Sunday from 4pm till 1am
How Much: Free before 7pm, $5 thereafter...

After a brilliant launch event last Sunday, Uber Lingua at the
Abercrombie
offers an equally killer lineup in the well known Broadway beer garden
this
Sunday November 26th from 4pm...

http://www.uberlingua.com/syd

Indigenous hip hop artist Wire MC headlines with a live set of his
self-proclaimed "country rebel" and 'abo-digital" beats.  A
Gumbayngirri
descendent from Bowraville (NSW), Wire MC has become a familiar,
rousing
force at many venues around the country with appearances at Homebake,,
Womadelaide and Sydney Opera House. In offering a viewpoint that
promotes
positive co-existence, international film maker, George Gittoes
('Soundtrack
to War') recently described him as "the best rapper in Australia".

Armed with only voice, sampler and delay pedal, Wei Zen melds South
East
Asian sounds with contemporary electronica.  Described by Radio
National's
Tim Ritchie as "an aural and mental adventure", Wei Zen is the creative
force behind minimal electronic crew Tufa (on pause mode currently)
and has recently returned from twosolo shows in Beijing.  She heralds
in the twilight with a live set at 6pm.

Bringing up the rear, The Herd bass player and long-time Frigid DJ
Prince V
drops tracks from his trans-lingual collection, plus there's sets from
Argentine selector Spex and collaborator MC Hernan, and Uber resident
Stu
Buchanan (host of FBi's Fat Planet).

Once again we'll be serving up a BBQ of marinated Tofu Strips, non-pork
based meats and all the extras you can think of... The Abercrombie as
always
has it's highly competitive grog prices...

The first 40 people down to the gig get either an admit one ticket or a
2for1 ticket to George Gittoes new film RAMPAGE that's set in the war
fields
of Miami!

Every event is recorded for use on our weekly SBS Alchemy Radio
residency
(see below)

--
Wei Zen
+61416 038 897

... so, enjoy!

RAC on David Hicks, anti-environmentalist screenings and refugee actions ; 'Take Away', Jewellery at Gaffa; Brendan Penzer at 'Don't Look 'Gallery

2006-11-21T02:03:00.000+11:00

Good on RAC for going on struggling against the enemy within!

Hi all, People may well be aware that GetUp! is running a (worthy) campaign to fund billboards aimed at shaming the Federal government in its refusal to meet with them over the 50,000 signatures they gathered demanding the return of David Hicks.

https://www. getup.org. au/secure/ donatehicks. asp

On 9 December, anti-war activists and civil rights groups around the country are planning to organise a National Day of Action around the issue of David Hicks to coincide with UN Human Rights Day, and have asked GetUp! if they would publicise these rallies by putting out an email and adding something to their email list.

It would seem the logical thing to do, but so far GetUp! seem far from keen to associate themselves with these rallies. The rally organisers are asking people involved in other movements to contact GetUp! to lobby them (I'm going to send this email on to some of the rally organisers). There are already links being made between Christmas Island detention centre ("Camp X-mas") and Guantanamo Bay.

This link has a campaigns email address and phone number...

http://www.getup. org.au/page. asp?page_ id=2

For NSW RAC folk...although we aren't meeting weekly at the moment, could people please let me know be if there are any objections to me sending a (polite but direct) letter off to them on our behalf. I guess it would be good to send it by the end of the week, so let me know ASAP. People should feel free to contact GetUp! as individuals anyway.

cheers/solidarity

Mark

Note: forwarded message attached.

__,_._,___

Message transféré [ Télécharger | Enregistrer dans Yahoo! Porte-documents ]

De:	"GetUp"
À:	mgoudkamp@yahoo.com
Objet:	Make a billboard speak for you
Date:	Thu, 16 Nov 2006 13:31:36 +1100

Pièce jointe au format HTML [ Consulter et sauvegarder dans l'ordinateur | Enregistrer dans Yahoo! Porte-documents ]

Dear friends,

Foreign Minister Alexander Downer has now twice refused to meet with GetUp to receive your 50,000-strong petition calling for David Hicks to be brought home. This is nothing more than a slap in the face to you, and our collective call for justice and the rule of law.

Since he won't meet with us, we've decided to take your message directly to him. Right now we are working with the best media buyers in the country to book strategic, highly prominent billboards where Alexander Downer, Philip Ruddock and John Howard can't ignore you - on the roads between where they live and work.

Can you help fund billboards like they've never seen? The more money we raise today the better resourced our campaign, and the more billboards we'll be able to purchase.

https://www.getup.org.au/secure/donatehicks.asp

We've been sidelined while our Government has ignored David Hicks' basic rights, along with the growing chorus of condemnation from world leaders, international legal experts, church groups, human rights campaigners and the public - for nearly five years.

What's worse, they've just broken their promise to have David Hicks brought home by November if he was still imprisoned without charge. And last week in Fremantle, as his US military defence lawyer Marine Major Michael Mori held a meeting with all state and territory attorneys-general to discuss his client's treatment, Philip Ruddock actually walked out. But you can still hear what Major Mori has to say on GetUp's latest blog.

Against the overwhelming recognition that enough is enough, our Government still wants David Hicks - and their refusal to protect his basic legal rights - to be kept invisible. Help us put the truth right in their faces.

https://www.getup.org.au/secure/donatehicks.asp

We have a crucial window to act now, before they plan to charge David Hicks under another made-up system so unfair military lawyers will be challenging it for years. All options are on the table to put the message out where it packs a punch: including interactive SMS counters so passers by can be added to the petition, as well as carbon-neutral mobile billboards to follow John Howard, Alexander Downer and Philip Ruddock around in their chauffeur-driven cars.

We don't have the power to bring David Hicks home from Guantanamo - our Government does. But we do have the power to make this human being and his appalling treatment visible again. With your help, those who have sat back and looked the other way will be held accountable, publicly.

Help us put our messages up where millions of Australians will see them. Click on the link below to donate, and you can also read the latest update to GetUp members from Major Michael Mori.

https://www.getup.org.au/secure/donatehicks.asp

Thank you for taking action to make our voices heard,
The GetUp team

PS: GetUp has also been working with the former Prime Minister, Malcolm Fraser, on the launch of www.AustraliansAll.com.au - a new website kicking off today aimed at promoting an open, diverse society where all people are protected by the rule of law. We encourage you to check out and support this important initiative.

Then there is an anti-environmentalist happening you have to react against if you care for environment, obviously...

Dear NAt'l RAC members,

(this is an edit of a forwarded message - original sender below)

The Institute of Public Affairs are screening an anti-activist,
anti-environmentali st 'documentary' : "Mine Your Own Business". The movie
is being shown with a requested "$10 donation" ---->>>> So let's fill it up
with people who refuse to donate the $10.

There's also a question time with the filmmakers at the end where we can
ask curly questions.

See the IPA website at http://ipa.org. au/events/ event_detail. asp?eventid= 120

There are one-off screenings in Sydney, Melbourne, Hobart and Perth - table
below and on the website. Please forward this email far and wide.... we
want that cinema full of the very people they are against.

You need to register - so get your corporate gear on and let's fill it up!!

------
DETAILS:
The Institute of Public Affairs will be screening Mine Your Own Business at
the following locations

Melbourne, 20 November 2006 Arthur Streeton Auditorium, Sofitel Melbourne, 25 Collins Street. Hobart, 21 November 2006 Old Woolstore Theatrette, 1 Macquarie Street. Sydney, 22 November 2006 Dendy Opera Quays, Shop 9, 2 East Circular Quay. Perth, 23 November 2006 Cinema Paradiso, 164 James St, Northbridge. Screenings at all venues begin at 6pm. The film will be followed by a
discussion with Phelim McAleer and Ann McElhinney. $10 donations welcome.
Payment can be made at the door.

To register contact Georgina Hamilton on 03 9600 4744 or ghamilton@ipa. org.au

...and last thursday came that call out:

Not great news I'm afraid, but it shows why we need to keep the refugee movement alive, even if at a reduced level.

1. It's a pity that the SMH didn't run the diagram describing Christmas Island as "Camp Xmas" in its hard copy edition. But here it is in their online version. I reckon we could easily adopt that slogan (forgive me if any RAC groups have already been referring to it in this way)

ht t p://www.smh. com.au/news/ national/ detention- camp-has- it-all-but- no-people/ 2006/11/16/ 1163266639951. html

2. Yet another high court decision catering to the government's needs. Two Afghan TPVers lose their case about ability of govt to deport them if their home country is deemed safe.

http://www.smh. com.au/news/ national/ afghans-sent- packing-after- court-rules- on-temporary- visas/2006/ 11/15/1163266639 862.html

I think these events merit a media release. Does anyone have any time?

Mark

------------ -

ORIGINAL ALERT FROM:

Rebecca Hubbard
Community Campaign Coordinator
The Wilderness Society WA
P: 08 9420 7255
M: 0401 854 912
F: 08 9226 0994

A: CityWest Lotteries House, 2 Delhi St, West Perth WA 6005

... and since you do care for environment, you can go and visit this exhibition by Brendan Penzer, who seriously and creatively care about the matter:

Hello friends,

You are all invited to my latest exhibition - 'It's Time For A Climate
Change' an un(site)ly specific installation at Don't Look Experimental
New Media Gallery.

Exhibition Opening Wed 22 November
6pm-8pm

Don't Look Gallery
419 New Canterbury Rd
Dulwich Hill

Ph Greg for further information
0401 152 434

It would be great to see you there
Peace
Brendan Penzer


Opening at Gaffa, 330 Crown Street, Surry Hills,
this Thursday 23rd November 6-8pm


:::TAKE AWAY '06:::
An Annual exhibition by the JMGA (Jeweller's and
Metalsmith's Group of Aus)

Opening Thurs 23rd November (running until the 5th Dec)

JMGA's annual member's exhibition will showcase an
incredibly diverse and exciting range of contemporary
object art and craft. Work can be "taken away" at
time of purchase and a polaroid picture of the object
put in its place, bending the rules of the traditional
exhibition purchase.

NAS "Late Fee" racket scandal

2006-11-18T12:27:00.000+11:00

Gossip networks are great. There should be more of them around.

I received an email from a student yesterday: "hey, guys, did you pre-enrol for next year? The deadline is TODAY! and the late fee is $50."

Wot?

I checked the NAS website, at the "enrolment" page.
Nothun.

"- Oh, yeah, we put a notice on all the doors on Wednesday 15th.... the students services person said on the phone.
- But hold on, that's a 2 days notice, it's ridiculus! It's been announced after the end of the classes, no-one is on the campus!..."

Besides, I had gone there on Thursday 17th, and I must have gone through the two only doors they forgot to put the notice on... or what??!!
"- Look, that's beside the point. Do you want to get the application form online?..."

You bet I do. Can you include a petition form as well, so I can circulate it among all the students I know during the break and let you know what we think of such a practice? Because it is not beside the point to express concerns about the honesty of such a way to deal with enrolment. Even the Office of Community Housing shows more respect to its "valued customers" by allowing at least seven working day for reply.
Did we march on the Parliament House to keep a place like THIS?

T'fouh.

Gao Wingjian at 4A: an exceptional 1day exhibition

2006-11-15T13:22:00.001+11:00

The interior landscapes of Gao Xingjian
>
> The Asia-Australia Arts Centre will hold a one-day exhibition on
> Thursday 23rd November 2006, of seven Chinese ink paintings by 2000
> Nobel Laureate Gao Xingjian – including the 300 cm long painting Goût
> de l’encre – to celebrate the new HarperCollins publication of his
> book The Case for Literature.
>
> Mabel Lee, of the University of Sydney, who has made Gao Xingjian’s
> works available in the English language through her acclaimed
> translations, will present a talk at 6.30pm on the topic: “Art and 
> Literature in the Life of Gao Xingjian”.
>
> Best known internationally as a novelist and playwright, Gao
> Xingjian’s paintings grace the covers of the HarperCollins editions
of
> his books Soul Mountain (2000), One Man’s Bible (2002), Buying a
> Fishing Rod for My Grandfather (2004), and The Case for Literature
> (2006).
>
> The Asia Australia Arts Centre is delighted to host the first
> exhibition of Gao Xingjian’s paintings in Australia, which will
> include four original works, three limited-edition prints, and a
> number of posters for his plays.
>
> Gao Xingjian’s first solo exhibitions were held in 1985, in Beijing,
> Berlin and Vienna. He has since held more than forty solo exhibitions
> in France, Sweden, Germany, Poland, Taiwan, Hong Kong, USA, Spain and
> Belgium. In 2005 a major retrospective exhibition of sixty works was
> held at the Singapore Art Museum, and in 2007 he will hold a solo
> exhibition at Notre Dame University in Chicago.
>
> His paintings have been included in major international exhibitions
> and public collections, and have been collected by private collectors
> from all parts of the world.  

Events and exhibitions at The Asia Australia Arts Centre (Gallery 4a)
are free and open to the public. We cordially invite you to join us.

The Asia Australia Arts Centre (Gallery 4a)
181-187 Hay Street Sydney NSW 2000
ph (02) 9212 0380 f (02) 9555 0873

Alpha House Sketch-Club Models list, 19 Nov 06 to 4th March 07

2006-11-15T11:57:00.000+11:00

2006

November

19th Nick or Tania
26th NO SESSION: BAS EXHIBITION

December

3rd Jaqi
10th Claire
17th Jill
24th NO SESSION: MERRY CHRISTMAS!
31st NO SESSION: HAPPY NEW YEAR!

2007

January

7st Tess (who's pregnant)
14th Jaqi
21th Lola
28nd Ole

February

4th Jill
11th Hank
18th Claire
25th Lola

March

4th Ole
11th Jill
18th
25th

... and then, you will see...

February

Two Shows At Alpha House!

2006-11-11T14:34:00.000+11:00

Alpha House Artists Co-operative is the centre of the world, didn't you know? Well, at least it is meant to be at the centre of this blog, so here are the last news (for the gossips, link on "Flâner la bombe". Fluffytown is 100% serious!)

If everything is all right, Saturday 18th November, 6-8pm, we'll have a re-enactment of "In Bed With The Enemy", the only demonstration in the world held by just ONE person (it was me, thanks...), with bed, enemy, postcards and video piece. Everybody welcome.

Then Friday 24th is the opening of the Brandling Street Art Society Painting & Drawing Exhibition, 6-8pm, running on Saturday 25th, 10-3pm, and Sunday 26th 11-3pm. Don't miss that vibrant contribution to our local community.

Alpha House Gallery, 226 Union Street, Erskineville, contact number Anna 0421 950 380.

Fluffy

Fluffy Goes To Bollywood

2006-11-09T14:03:00.000+11:00

... Fluffytown! is an international blog: so for the ones who don't disdain to have frog on their plate, this is what's happening in Paris at the moment: a new LGTB association called La Tapette En Bois (I won't even try to translate that now, it would take a fifty pages essay. Sorry dudes) is having its soirées GPT (Say JayPayTay if you don't wanna sound plouc, and keep in mind it means I farted...;) where "good taste" is really challenged, as well as prejudice and neo-liberalism/conservatism. Drinks, for it's a bar, practical workshops, political discussion forums, exchange fairs... la vraie vie, quoi. Just for the sake of exoticism...

Bonsoir CamaradEs

Et voilà dimanche de
18 à 23h on remet ça,
un espace différent
avec des consos à prix
modérés, une entrée sur
libre participation,
mais GPT c'est surtout
un moment pour les
TransPédéGouines où
tout est possible,il
suffit de proposer,
allez... vas-y, lance-toi !

voici le programme "prévu"  :

un atelier relaxation "visage et cul" par Victor

un atelier partage d'infos sur la résistance montante aux rafles d'expulsion des sans papiers, comment s'y
impliquer individuellement,collectivement ?

et nos ateliers de travaux pratiques : couture, coiffure, tricot...

et en plus des tables ...

foire aux fringues : apporte les fringues que tu mets plus, repars

avec d'autres !

table de presse de la Mutants at work (sous réserve)

Pour celles qui ont peur de se perdre, voici l'adresse :

Péniche Antipode / Face au 69 quai de la Seine / Paris 19ème

En plus, voici le site de la péniche avec toutes les infos :

http://www.abricadabra.fr/acces.html

biz

Mr Katia pour La Tapette en Bois





....Closer from us Fluffysiders, tonight Thursday there's an opening at Gaffa!

(cf previous post "Back from Hell...to a hell (of a lot)".



Then at Gallery 4A in the city,
open the books on Friday 17th November, 6-8pm;
the exhibition is running until
the 6th of December.


















That's all, Fluffs!

Luscious Wednesday night

2006-11-07T22:54:00.000+11:00

Just a reminder that a couple of excellent gigs are on this Wednesay, and at 8ish, you'll have to choose between Kath Ellis and the Church of Kathellicism at the Buzzz bar, 349 King Street,Newtown (fortnightly gig) , and Jaqi Pascoe and friends at the Hollywood Hotel, Surry Hills (weekly residency).

Cheers!

Fluff

Back from hell...to a hell:(of a lot:)

2006-11-06T00:29:00.000+11:00

no I haven't disappeared from the circulation, and I am not a slack. I just had a very confused and busy last fortnight. But, back on the track with a burning hot pack of (invites) cards. Ready for the 80's?

At the Mori Gallery (168 Day Street, Sydney):

Claire Conroy

Light speed

A journey across Sydney in a pinhole camera

A group show of Ngaanyatjarra artists from the Warburton Community

The money story

Khaled Sabsabi

Opening : Wednesday 8 November 2006

Exhibition: 8 November - 2 December 2006



...and read Zanny'paper on Claire's works...

Lightspeed

An exhibition by

Claire Conroy

MORI GALLERY

168 DAY STREET SYDNEY

Opening Wednesday 8 November 2006 6-8pm

Exhibition 8 November – 2 December 2006

Wednesday – Saturday

11-6 or by appointment +612 92832903

‘Nepean River’ 3m x 1m pin-hole photograph by Claire Conroy

Lightspeed: a journey across Sydney in a pin-hole camera

“The biggest piece of domestic machinery, which is an extension of our homes and our own private space, is the motorcar. When people drive they have the possibility of death at their own fingertips. And then, people are aware of a whole range of emotions that can't express when they're in their office, dealing with other people, that they can express alone in a car. You can't swear at your secretary for making a spelling mistake but you can swear at another driver behind your windshield” JG Ballard.

Lightspeed: a journey across Sydney in a pin-hole camera is an ambitious solo exhibition by Claire Conroy which opens at Mori Gallery on November 8. Conroy has transformed a 2 tonne truck into a pin-hole camera and taken a road trip across Sydney from Berry Island reserve in Sydney Harbour west towards the Blue Mountains. With a small hole drilled in the side of the truck Conroy stopped at various points along the way using the power of natural sunlight to document her journey. The results are a virtuoso series of 3 meter photographic paper negative prints of the view from the road – toll gates, motorways, bridges, roads, car parks and roadside scenery.

While the truck-stop has been a recurring source of artistic inspiration, perhaps most memorably captured in Ed Ruscha's photographs of gas stations from California to Oklahoma, Conroy's use of the pin-hole camera allows the viewer to return to the roadsid

e image in a startlingly new way. The long exposure times - Conroy spent hours holed up inside an often sweltering truck waiting for the image to expose – has the curious affect of capturi

ng the solid infrastructure of the road whilst deleting the moving elements of the cars.

This coupled with the negative quality of pinhole prints makes Conroy's images extremely dark, brooding and ominous. The black skies, ghostly white trees, and completely empty roads imbues Lightspeed with a post-apocalyptic feeling of life after the crash of civilisation.

Conroy explains that one of her inspirations for this work was David Cronenburg’s film adaptation of the 1973 novel by JG Ballard Crash. Ballard's controversial book uses the metaphor of the car crash to explore aspects of contemporary psychology. It tells the story, through the author's own voice, of a man who, after surviving a car crash, gets involved with a group of people sexually obsessed with celebrity, death and car crashes.

At a crucial moment in the film one of the characters tell the hero “that’s the future Ballard and your already part of it, there is a benevolent psycho-pathology that beckons towards us… the car crash [is a] fertilising rather than destructive event.” Conroy pursues this metaphor in her work by opening it up to a new layer of meaning. What if the crash were not the specific experience of tragedy on the motorway, fuelled by psycho-sexual addiction to cars, but the crash of motorway culture itself?

In each of Conroy’s prints she carefully counter poses organic and natural elements alongside the empty infrastructure of roads. These subtle and gentle juxtapositions remind the viewer of the environmental consequences of a society obsessed with cars. As Co

nroy explains “in using an old mode of photography such as pin hole photography I have attempted to in some way slow the world down.” Conroy’s work thus situates the viewer between the autopia and the autogeddon, a strange world where the structure of the landscape if dominated by the car and yet the car itself has all but vanished from the picture.

Of course this exit is not entirely complete. Central to Conroy’s work is the understanding that the images you are looking at were taken through the medium of a truck, which was driven west out of Sydney on the motorway. And attached to several images are a series of soundscapes composed by Kelly Sturgiss (Flat Products Division), Naomi Radom (Coda), Jarrah Kidd (BumbleBeez81), Kate Carr, Toni Buck (The Necks), David Haines and Joyce Hinterding (Sun Valley), Giovanna Picoi (The Lunettes) and Sam Johnson (Swinging and Tasty Bag). Each of these artists has worked with found soun

d at the sites of the photographic exposures, incorporating the hum of the road into a sound piece which matches the time Conroy took to expose each image. These traces of road culture allow Conroy to explore the themes of this exhibition from an ambiguous position situated somewhere between a sci fi vision of the future and the well worn path of a road trip.

Article By Zanny Begg

...and now a message from Diego Bonetto:

Hi all,

During Movember (the month formerly known as November)
I’ll be growin a moustache. That’s right I’m bringing
the Mo back because I’m passionate about changing the
state of men’s health.

Male health is a major issue, did you know:

Men are far less healthy than women. The average life
expectancy of males is 6 years less than females.
Every year in Australia 2,700 men die of prostate
cancer – more than the number of women who die from
breast cancer.

Depression affects 1 in 6 men…Most don’t seek help.

Untreated depression is a leading risk factor for
suicide. Rates of suicide are more than double the
national road toll.
Help me change the

face of men’s health by sponsoring

my mo.

Attached is my face on day one of this campaign, do
sponsor my mo to get updates on the growth!

Please go to http://www.movember.com.au/au/sponsor,
enter my Rego number which is 27961 and your credit
card details. All donations of $2 and over are tax
deductible.

You could also donate directly to me and I'll issue an
official recepeit.

The money raised by Movember will be used to change

the face of men's health by creating awareness and
funding research into prostate cancer and male
depression.

Movember culminates at the end of the month at the Gala Partè where I’ll be parading my Mo on the cat
walk for a chance to be crowned the Man of Movember.
If you want to be part of this great night you’ll have
to purchase a Gala Parte ticket for $33.00 (inc GST).

Cheers

diego

More info is available at www.movember.com.au

Movember is proud partners with the Prostate Cancer
Foundation of Australia and beyondblue - the national
depression initiative.

Please forward to anybody in your mailimg list,

thanks

... and what's happening at Gaffa Gallery?

Gaffa

330 Crown Street

Surry Hills

Sydney

NSW 2010

www.gaffa.com.au

ph (61) 02 93806266

gallery hours mon-fri 12-6 sat 11-6 sun 12-5

opening this Thursday 9th November 2006

...and two messages from Mark Goudkamp and Jack Smit from the Refugee Action Coalition:

Hi all,

Asylum seekers are currently out of the media
spotlight, and detainees continue to trickle out of
Villawood and elsewhere (albeit often on bridging
visas or community detention arrangements) but this
doesn't mean that the campaign is over...not by a long

shot. For a start, there's the towed back asylum
seekers still on Lombok, and the Burmese who were sent
to Nauru the day after Howard's border protecion bill
was dropped (see 11 Dec forum below).
Also, the kind of demonisation John Howard and his
team used against asylum seekers during the 2001
election campaign and beyond continues under different
guises, particularly against people of muslim faith,
some of whom were in detention 5 years ago.

In this context, Malcom Fraser is right to warn:
"There are already suggestions that this next election
will be a Muslim election, as a while ago it was the
Tampa election. The groundwork has been laid for an
increase in fear and concern over the followers of
Islam."
http://www.smh. com.au/news/ national/ fraser-attacked- as-an-apologist- for-extremism/ 2006/11/01/ 1162339918511. html

In another issue related to the government's migration
program, RAC and many in the unions are concerned that
the Liberal Party's policy of 457 visas for guest
workers and their use by employers to obtain cheap
labour could result in a racist backlash, the only
beneficiary of which would be the government. Quite a
few of the detainees still in behind the wire wind up
there as a result of working "illegally".

To their credit, the unions are increasingly seeing
these hyper-exploited workers, not as a threat, but as
potential members whose wages and conditions ought to
be the same as their local counterparts.

RAC sees this issue as a very important cross-over
between the refugee, anti-racist and workers'
movements. The abuses carried out under the 457 visas

are starting to gain quite a bit of media attention.
http://www.smh. com.au/news/ NATIONAL/ Visa-workers- sacked-over- AWAs-union/ 2006/10/25/ 1161749192589. html
http://www.smh. com.au/news/ national/ exploited- chinese-staff- get-650000- back-pay/ 2006/10/31/ 1162278141522. html

Last night I attended an Industrial Relations forum
put on by the Teachers Federation, CFMEU and The
Greens, where the speeches by the delegate for the
Indian 457 guest workers and a Korean "illegal" were
very moving.

I've attached the leaflet, and copied the inline text
of it below. Please distribute as you see fit.

Also on the leaflet are details of our forum on the Pacific Solution on 11 December, and a plug for the

Gleebooks launch of "The sinking of the SIEV-X: a case
study for secondary students".

In solidarity
Mark Goudkamp for RAC
for more info, email offline to markgoudkamp@ gmail.com

************ *
Refugee Action Coaltion events for rest of 2006
1. Monday 27 November 6pm
Howard's 457 cheap labour visas: his next tool to
divide & rule?
Howard is again on the ropes in the lead up to a
federal election, mainly due to his anti-union IR
laws. We can be sure that over the next 12 months, he

will use any fear tactic possible.
This forum will discuss how to stand up to any fanning
of anti-foreign worker sentiment.
Tim Ayres: Ass't Secretary, Australian Manufacturing
Workers' Union (NSW); Nikolai Haddad: migration
lawyer; plus speaker from Refugee Action Coalition.

2. Monday 11 December 6pm
Stranded by the Pacific Solution
A night for UN Human Rights day/RAC Xmas party
Anna Rose & Tony Bozdagci, recent visitors to asylum
seekers on Lombok, will present their doco.
Charlotte will speak on the Burmese who were recently
sent to Nauru
Plus an update on West Papua

Both meetings are in Room 2, Level 1, NSW Teachers Federation, 23 Mary St Surry Hills
Refreshments provided (gold coin donation)
For more info, go to www.racnsw.net or call 0422078376
Subscribe to our email list:

racnsw-subscribe@ yahoogroups. com

Also… Monday 4 December, 6pm for 6.30
Launch of SIEV-X school case study
This case study for secondary school students has
already come under attack from the Federal government,

but is supported by the History Teachers Association
and the NSW Teachers Federation
Gleebooks, 49 Glebe Point Rd, 9660 2333

Dear NAt'l RAC members,

++++++++++++ +++++++++ +++++++++ +++++++++ +++++++++
People and Planet: the 2007 Social Justice and Environment Diary
++++++++++++ +++++++++ +++++++++ +++++++++ +++++++++

In this email:

• The 2007 Social Justice and Environment Diary
• The Christmas season 2006: ALL your orders will be gift-wrapped!

Dear all,

I'm delighted to email you with some very exciting news: in a novel and
creative collaboration project with dozens of Australian Non-Government

Organisations (full list below) activist alliances and citizens' groups, we
can now offer a great item and a unique Christmas present:

++++++++++++ +++++++++ +++++++++ +++++++++ +++++++++
People and Planet: the 2007 Social Justice and Environment Diary
++++++++++++ +++++++++ +++++++++ +++++++++ +++++++++

For more information and to order:
http://www.safecom. org.au/people- planet-diary. htm

Made from fully recycled paper, the Diary shows seven days per page, is
designed using spiral binding, and features throughout the year photographs
from local communities around the world, including Tibet, Solomon Islands,
Bolivia, Laos, PNG, Peru and many other places, the Diary carries the small
price tag of $18.

Many of the groups and NGO's that support the The People and Planet Diary
2007, have their advertisement in the Diary. By purchasing the Diary from

us, you will help to support and fund the independent citizens' movement in
Australia.

So, buy one, two, three or four from us: as with all our products from now
on, they will all be individually gift-wrapped in the lead-up to Christmas
2006!

For more information and to order:
http://www.safecom. org.au/people- planet-diary. htm

Global Trade Watch (GTW), an Australian grassroots group campaigning for
democratic, environmentally sustainable and fair trading systems, can be
credited with starting the initiative for The People and Planet Diary 2007.
In the introduction GTW states:

"People and Planet 2007 has been published as a joint project between some
of the many hundreds of small organisations active in communities around

Australia. Organisations which are working quietly but diligently to create
a more just and more environmentally sustainable society - not only in
their own communities, but often nationally and internationally too. Few of

these organisations receive regular media coverage or have big public
profiles, but almost all are making a real difference to people and
environments in Australia and overseas."

For more information and to order:
http://www.safecom. org.au/people- planet-diary. htm

++++++++++++ +++++++++ ++++
List of participating organisations:
++++++++++++ +++++++++ ++++

|~ Aid/Watch ~|~ Australian Democrats (Qld) ~|~ Australian Peace Committee
(SA) ~|~ Borderlands ~|~ East Timor Women Australia ~|~ Eco-Shout ~|~
Environment Centre of the Northern Territory ~|~ Environs Kimberley ~|~
Fair Go Trading (Perth) ~|~ Food Irradiation Watch | Free West Papua
Campaign Pacifica (Melbourne) ~|~ Friends of Kolkata ~|~ Friends of the
Earth Adelaide ~|~ Friends of the Earth Melbourne ~|~ Friends of the Earth

il of NSW
~|~ Pax Christi (Australia) ~|~ Project SafeCom ~|~ Refugee Action
Collective (Vic) ~|~ Refugee Action Committee, Canberra ACT ~|~ Rising Tide
Newcastle ~|~ Student Partnerships Worldwide ~|~ The Greens (NSW) ~|~ The
Trading Circle (Vic) ~|~ Toowoomba & Region Environment Council ~|~ Women's
Electoral Lobby ~|

http://www.safecom. org.au/people- planet-diary. htm

++++++++++++ +++++
Credit Card payments:
++++++++++++ +++++

Most of our products are now able to be purchased using your credit card.
Installation of a "Shopping Cart" system is complete for most items - it
takes just a few minutes to complete your transaction with the
well-credited PayPal system.

++++++++++++ +++++++++

Christmas presents galore....
++++++++++++ +++++++++

As per usual, we wrap all ordered items, from now on till Christmas, in
gift-wrap, ready for them to become your Christmas presents. Below is a
list of our products, ready for ordering by you.

++++++++++++ ++
Currently in stock:
++++++++++++ ++

The following titles are in stock on my latest count. This line-up is
"probably" correct: our Products Manager Justine is more informed than I am
these days about our products! If any of our products in "the shop" are
missing from the listing below, you can contact Justine through this
Shipping Query form:

http://www.safecom. org.au/shipping- query.htm

The Project SafeCom Shop:
http://www.safecom. org.au/products. htm

Antony Loewenstein, My Israel Question
http://www.safecom. org.au/israel- question. htm

Phil Sparrow, From Under a Leaky Roof
http://www.safecom. org.au/leaky- roof.htm

Helen Caldicott, Nuclear Power is not the Answer
http://www.safecom. org.au/caldicott .htm

Suad Amiry, Sharon and My Mother-in-Law
http://www.safecom. org.au/sharon- suad-amiry. htm

David Corlett, Following Them Home: the fate of the returned asylum seekers
http://www.safecom. org.au/following -them-home. htm

Janet Austin (ed), From Nothing to Zero, letters from detention centres
http://www.safecom. org.au/nothingto zero.htm

Tony Kevin, A Certain Maritime Incident - the sinking of SIEV X

http://www.safecom. org.au/tkevin- book1.htm

Robert Manne (ed), Do Not Disturb: Is the Media Failing Australia?
http://www.safecom. org.au/do- not-disturb. htm

Frank Brennan, Tampering with Asylum (2 copies only)
http://www.safecom. org.au/tampering .htm

(Music CD) The Scattered People Choir: Voices of Asylum seekers
http://www.safecom. org.au/scattered .htm

(DVD Movie) Dean Israelite's Spell Me Freedom (2 copies only)
http://www.safecom. org.au/spell- me-freedom. htm

Holiday Camp: the movie (VHS format) (2 copies only)
http://www.safecom. org.au/holidayca mp.htm

Dark Dreams: Australian Refugee Stories
http://www.safecom. org.au/dark- dreams.htm

To all of you who read this, I extend a warm thanks for your unrelenting
support shown to us at Project SafeCom during 2006, and best wishes for the
Christmas Season!

Until next year - Season's Greetings!

Jack H Smit
Project SafeCom Inc.
http://www.safecom. org.au/
P.O. Box 364
Narrogin WA 6312

phone (08) 9881-5651
mobile 0417 090 130
Fremantle Operations: (08) 9336-6048

...and if you were in Darlinghurst on Thursday arvo,

you had the opportunity to see Evil B.J. perform in full gear with her hospital bed and fluffy white gorilla Manilla between the National Art School and the College Of Fine Arts campuses. She gave her body to impersonate the hopes, fears and most of all ignorance surrounding the "wedding" that might happen during the summer break between two schools that would unite for the best and the worse. Especially the...

Check all the details by clicking on thr link "Flâner la bombe" or typing www.elfluff.blogspot.com

oh làlà!

2006-10-30T23:09:00.000+11:00

ok, this saturday, there was Russell Way at Sheffer Gallery, opening on Saturday the 4th of November and running till the 25th, 38 Lander St, chippi(chippo[lata]-chippendale, quoi.) "Bodyprint is a photo exhibition where layers of i,mages are interacting to provoke, you know, that flush....

www.climatechangeday.or

Dear Friend,

Climate change is so much in the news these days that we’ve probably all been wondering what we can do.

Well, here is an opportunity to do something positive to help our environment and make our own lives better at the same time.

On the world’s first Climate Change Day on December 1^st 2006 you can help make a BIG improvement to two interlinked climates that matter to us all:

our earth’s climate
our human climate

For the Climate Change Day campaign, thousands of people around the world are making pledges to:

reduce their personal greenhouse gas emissions
spend quality time boosting their human climate – i.e., enhancing their own inner wellbeing, or adding to the lives of people in their family, neighbourhood or workplace.

It’s easy! Climate Change Day has collated a myriad of examples that show just how simple it can be to make a BIG difference.

Why is it all so important?

Climate change and global warming affect us all. Changes in weather patterns, polar ice caps melting, rising sea levels and climbing temperatures are likely to displace millions of people, create massive changes in agriculture and threaten our treasured natural environments.

On the human front, at no other time has our race had to face such epidemic proportions of people suffering from depression, stress, poverty, conflict, drug abuse, obesity, chronic loneliness and youth suicide.

The good news it that there are simple things that YOU can do right now to slow down global warming and to transform the global human crisis.

Please visit the climate change website and make a difference today!

www.climatechangeday.org

et on enchaîne..

Neshan

The Australian International Exhibition of the Badge and the Logo and Coat of Arms

Adelaide 8 - 10 December 2006

Dear Exhibitors and community members

This year Rev Dr Jonathan Barker minister of the Pilgrim Uniting Church is honouring us by inviting us to move into their neighbourhood by participating in the annual "Who is your neighbour program" by showing Neshan in the Flinders Street church. in Adelaide . Take this unique opportunity to explore your own neighbourhood by sharing the badges and their story which you have collected. Meet the jews, muslims, christians, buddhists, journalists, politicians, writers, artists, socialists, women, peace activists, environmentalists, communists, unionists, young and older people so we can live together as neighbours in a better environment.

I want to invite you to join with me in:

“THE INTERNATIONAL EXHIBITION OF THE BADGE AND THE LOGO AND COAT OF ARMS”

Please supply a Badge and/or Logo of your own creation, or an existing Badge and/or Logo – to exhibit your views on an issue close to your heart.

The Badge/Logo should illustrate or represent your view (or organizational view) dealing with issues of importance in such areas as the Environment, Human Rights, Illicit Drug Abuse, War and Peace, Violence in the home, Religious or Sexual or Ethnic Intolerance, or any other issue of importance to our communities, society and the world. But please don’t be constrained by this sample list.If there are other issues of a more personal nature please let your views be seen. For example, Amnesty International has a well-known logo of a candle circled by barbed wire that was inspired by the Chinese proverb: “Better to light a candle than curse the darkness”.

Also,any badges that you have to exhibit with a written story of each badge, the badges will be exhibited under your name. If you don’t know the story of the badge you are still welcome to participate or you can write up to one page(you choose the number of words and the format) for all the badges you would like to exhibit.

After the exhibition has finished touring, the badges will be returned to the exhibitors if required. If not, the badges will be donated to the National Museum of Australia as a commemoration of the injury to society sustained in these years.

The Exhibition has had a successful showing in Canberra and Binalong with many people showing interest. It is my intent to show this exhibition nationally in Melbourne , Hobart , Perth , Darwin , Brisbane and Sydney as well as regionally. It may tour internationally.

As a result of the exhibition the material will be compiled into a series of research books for students of Iconography, Politics and History.

If you wish to participate in this travelling exhibition please supply:

Badges/logos or coat of arms which describes something of importance to you
Write a short statement describing the motivation behind the badge/logo/coat of arms.
Entries to be supplied by 30 November 2006
Exhibition will open Friday 8 December

Friday 8 December to Sunday 10 December 2006 at PILGRIM UNITING CHURCH in the CITY

12 Flinders Street Adelaide South Australia Ph 08 8212 3295 Fax 08 8212 9637 Email: pilgrim@pilgrim.org.au Opening performance 10:30 am Friday 8 December

For more information please contact:

Dr Jonathan Barker Email: pilgrim@pilgrim.org.au Ph 08 82123295 Fax 08 82129637

Raelene Telfer Email: rjtelfer@aapt.net.au Tel: 0883580689 Mobile : 0410058221

Andrew Shore Email: andrew.shore@ecovortek.com PO Box 1132 Stirling SA 5152 Tel: 0883392730 Mobile : 0438858343

Regards 26 October 2006

Ardeshir Gholipour

Canberra P.O. Box 573 , Civic Square, ACT 2608, Australia

ardeshirpprb@yahoo.com.au,

Please help us by e-mailing this to your friends or releasing to any media

Please address all email to:
Ardeshir Gholipour

Three pics of the 'Thyrsis'

2006-10-19T16:18:00.000+10:00

Eleven artless poo-men are trapped in a shopping-trolley of a jail, and like a single man, they're escaping from it any way they can. That is 'the Great Escape' and it could be it.

But above the shopping trolley hangs an abstract structure made of balsa wood and coiled galvanised wire, 'Coils and Tears'. Blue oil is dripping from it and falling randomly onto the escapees.

This is a 4D work because firstly, the oil pouring turns it into a clepsydron; and the raw clay the poo-men are made of, slowly shrinking, introduces an element of risk and unsteadiness in their position, thus remindind us that they're in an uncomfortable situation, to say the least.

SIEV X Screening

2006-10-19T16:14:00.000+10:00

Congratulations to the people who've worked tirelessly
on this valuable project (see link and article below).
The minister and the government she's a part of
clearly don't think that informing students about what
has happened in our recent history with asylum seekers,
or instiling them a sense of compassion or open
mindedness, forms a part of "Australian values".

A reminder that in Sydney this Monday 23 October, 6pm,
RACNSW will screen a short documentary about the
SIEV-X tragedy, and and discuss potential campaigning
around the issue.

Room 2, First floor, Teachers Federation, 23 Mary St
Surry Hills (between Albion & Reservoir Sts).

************ *****

http://www.abc. net.au/news/ newsitems/ 200610/s1768811. htm

Last Update: Thursday, October 19, 2006. 1:28pm (AEST)

Ms Bishop says the SIEV X disaster should not be used
to push an agenda. (file photo) (ABC TV)

Minister concerned at schools' SIEV X case study

The federal Education Minister, Julie Bishop, has
accused the authors of a case study on the SIEV X
maritime disaster of using the incident
inappropriately to promote a political agenda.

More than 350 asylum seekers died when the boat known
as the SIEV X sank on its way to Australia in 2001.

A group claiming no affiliation with any political
organisation, has launched a case study of the
disaster to be used in New South Wales secondary
schools.

Ms Bishop says she has nothing against children being
taught facts in history classes but she does have
concerns about the plan to use the study in schools.

"A tragic accident should not be used to push a
political agenda and students need to be given the
facts, and not unsubstantiated rumour, in order to
form their own judgements and form their own opinions
about this matter."

However, the Opposition's Immigration spokesman, Tony
Burke, has endorsed the plan to teach children about
the SIEV X disaster.

"SIEV X is part of Australian history," Mr Burke said.

"It's part of our experience for the simple reason
that the people on that vessel were on their way to
Australia hoping to become Australians and I don't
think we should pick and choose which parts of our
history are appropriate for children to know about."

************ ***

Here's some links to stories about the opening of the
SIEV-X memorial, which a couple of us from Sydney and
Melbourne RACs attended in Canberra on Sunday.

http://canberra. yourguide. com.au/detail. asp?story_ id=517078
http://www.smh. com.au/news/ NATIONAL/ Anniversary- of-Siev-X- disaster- marked/2006/ 10/15/1160850808 238.html

Mark

Wreck, Heat and the Fluffy Note

2006-10-16T20:25:00.000+10:00

As a National Art School student, I was wondering like the rest of us why the hell Maquarie Uni, after accepting to take over our Darlo Landerneau, had finally decided to let the hen down. Well the answer might be given by UWS actually (here, big big thank you to Mayhem). Isn't it because, like the later, they'd like to get rid of the arts altogether? :( and soon repeat Goebbels words, "Each time I hear the word culture, I grab my gun"? Doesn't it make you shudder?

Merdre. (Read again your Jarry's King Ubu if you reckon I should have written merde.)

So, if you find this as absurd as we all do, just read this:

"Dear All,

I know there's a lot to be said against internet
petitions, but this UWS thing is terrible!

First NAS is being given the merger shove and NOW -
the entire visual and performing arts faculty of a
university - is being shut down.

THIS IS NOT A GET-UP Petition!

PLEASE:go to:

http://www.petitiononline.com/uws6Arts/petition.html

and sign the petition, or start writing to your state
and fedral pollies and newspapers - all the ones that
keep murmering about Arts in Western Sydney being
really important.

PLEASE forward this onto your networks/friends/ anyone
you might know who gives a damn about art, education,
new media and culture.

Cut and paste the letter below:

SAVE UWS ARTS

This petition is an initiative of University of
Western Sydney arts students, to protest the decision
on the part of the University's College of Arts/School
of Communication Arts to suspend its Fine Arts and
Electronic Arts programs and abandon its Performance
program. The Fine Arts and Electronic Arts programs as
they currently exist are being taught out, and the
plan is for a Bachelor of Contemporary Arts to replace
them. Intake for this program has been indefinitely
suspended. Show your support for the implementation of
this program by signing this petition. We believe it
is important that this proposed program, when
implemented, services the professional needs of arts
students, lecturers and the arts communities in
western Sydney.

Please support art education in western Sydney by
signing this petition and forwarding this link to your
network. For information and updates go to the Save
UWS Arts Blog: http://www.saveuwsarts.blogspot.com

Thanks for your support.

Sincerely,

Or make up your own.

You can get more info at :
http://saveuwsarts.blogspot.com/

Cheers

Margaret Mayhew

Margaret Mayhem
Reading, Writing, Drawing, Rabble Rousing
All performed professionally and at reasonable cost
Ph: 0421735512
Art Writing: http://artandmayhem.blogspot.com "

Oh, and there's global warming too... 37°c in Sydney on SAturday, made everyone's head hot, starting by my fluffy one!

so if you feel concerned, just read this:

Dear NAt'l RAC members,

The issue of Climate Change (read: Industrial Climate Disaster) is likely
soon to become the Ultimate and Overriding social issue in Australia,
outranking all other social justice and human rights issues in our country.

PLEASE JOIN US at

++++++++++++ +++++++++ ++++++++
THE 2006 WALK AGAINST WARMING
++++++++++++ +++++++++ ++++++++

On the

++++++++++++ +++++++++ +++++++++ +++++
International Day of Action on Climate Change
++++++++++++ +++++++++ +++++++++ +++++

Saturday November 4, 2006

This year's second "Walk Against Warming" is likely to become, and SHOULD
become, the single largest citizens' action in our country since a long
time - and hopefully the largest citizen's action in Australian history - if
for no other reason, then for the fact that this year's drought goes on the
record as the biggest drought ever.

There's a Walk Against Warming also NEAR YOU ... check the website through
the link below - all known locations so far are listed.

For more information: http://www.safecom. org.au/walk- against-warming. htm

---------
This message was disseminated by

Jack H Smit
Project SafeCom Inc.
http://www.safecom. org.au/
P.O. Box 364
Narrogin WA 6312
.

One species threatened by the aforementioned warming is the mole. Icannot but be concerned by it, since it's described as having "a pink fluffy exterior"!
ARTISTS: Make a difference, Make a mole

Call out to Artists
As part of the fight to save Yellabinna Environment association on
Kokatha Mula land, we are calling out to artists to recreate the
Kokatha mole as a plush stuffed creature to be exhibited and auctioned
as a fundraiser for the ‘mole hunt’ and fight to save the land.

Kokatha country covers large stretches of harsh arid land in the far
west of South Australia, stretching from Ceduna to the edge of the
Nullabor, It is home to Kokatha Mula people. Yellabinna is culturally
significant to the Kokatha Mula Seven Sisters dreaming is connected
throughout the Yellabinna sand dune system by rockholes. Yellabinna is
home to 4 million hectares of pristine mallee woodlands, and to
critically endangered blind marsupial mole amongst other threatened
species.

This precious country is now under threat from extensive mineral
exploration and undergoing feasibility studies to begin large open cut
sand mining project.

As a tool to protect this special county, there is currently a search
on for the endangered blind marsupial mole known as the ‘Notoryctes
Caurinus’. There have been few sightings of the mole in recent years,
however the documentation of this endangered species could be a crucial
element in saving the largest mallee woodland in the world.
So we are calling upon artists to recreate this beautiful little
creature. We are planning to tour the exhibition to Mori Gallery,
Sydney CBD, TINA in Newcastle, Alice Springs, and hopefully many other
destinations in Australia. EXHIBITIONS WILL BEGIN IN LATE SEPTEMBER, SO
WE NEED ARTISTS TO CONTACT US AS SOON AS POSSIBLE.
If you are interested in participating, we will send you out an
artist
kit with more detailed information, images, and an official patch for
your mole. Also if you know of a gallery which may be interested in
housing this unique exhibition, please let us know.

Please contact Renata on 0422854184 or renatafield@yahoo.com.au
For more information on Googatha land see http://googatha.tripod.com/

Mole specs
: 15-20cm long
: 7-12cm high
: Pink fluffy exterior
: 2 fleshy coloured flippers 5-10cm long
: Stunted fleshy coloured tail 2-3cm long
: Hidden facial features
A google image search of "Notoryctes Caurinus" will give image results

Now, I can hear you mumble: who's responsible for the global warming? global d$^£*k heads?
well, hum,

The 2006 G20 meeting of finance ministers, reserve bank governors and
heads of the World Bank and IMF will take place in Melbourne on
November 18-19. This will be the most significant gathering in
Melbourne of people responsible for pushing corporate-led
globalisation, neoliberalism and capitalism since the World Economic
Forum in 2000.
Global corporate capitalism is a ruthless system — a system with scant
regard for the interests of humans. It has co-opted and corrupted our
political leadership, and the leadership of many other nations. Our
action should be seen as a vote of no confidence in this leadership, an
act of defiance and resistance, and a demand that our democracy return
to valuing the interests of humans and the environment above all else.
You can help.
www.stopg20.org

But Fluff is Fluff, so since the Fluff must go on, take a walk on the fluffy side;
at Gaffa Galllery, there is:

:::Four Steps Forward:::

Exhibition opening night drinks @ Gaffa This THursday 19th 6-8pm
(Runs until 24th Oct)

Simone Letat, Karen Sullivan, Kath Fries & Michele Morcos

Four Steps Forward is an exhibition by four artists who would all
describe
themselves as painters. Yet their work ranges across a vast array of
materials and mediums. All have a sense of humor or playful exploration
that marks a crucial point in the individual creative process. Four
Steps
Forward captures a sense of each different direction and the relentless
push forwards.

WOMYN, GENDER and SEXUALITY Gala Nights!

2006-10-16T18:43:00.000+10:00

WHEN: Wednesday the 25th of October, Thursday the 26th
of October and Sunday the 29th of October.

WHERE: Lan Franchis Memorial Discothèque 144 Cleveland
St Chippendale

MOTIVATIONS and AIMS

Skit for Tat will present a diverse range of
performance acts such as short skits, spoken word,
musical performances and two themed discussions over
two nights, as well as a closing film night on the
29th of October. The aim is to present performances
that will expose issues pertinent to womyn, gender and
sexuality.

It must be made clear that the aim of the project is
not merely to present, nor merely to entertain, but
that on top of providing performances of quality, we
will be aiming to encourage thought-provoking,
dynamic, challenging and analytical discussions on WGS
issues.

Moreover, we will be prioritizing groups as well as
individuals who are in some way marginalized or in
need of more public exposure.
Project Proposal for

WHO is involved:

We are a loose network of emerging performers,
playwrights, spoken word artists as well as
experienced social workers and activists. This will be
elaborated upon below.

However, the contact person and (self-appointed!)
coordinator would be:
Rani P. Lukita
Mobile: 0401 504 800
E-mail: rani_lukita@yahoo.fr

Wed 25th

8.00-8.10pm Annie (spoken word)

8.10-8.20pm Cyberspace Whispers: (skit) is a work of
Verbatim theatre, using the voices of real people in
order to personalise the political message that it
encompasses. The play is structured as the blog entry
of one woman, living in the midst of a large scale
conflict who writes about the way in which her
everyday life, as a woman, is interrupted by the
turbulence around her. The piece will be directed by
Emily Calder and Pip Hetherington.

8.20-8.35 The Her-story of Cuntopolis:
A one-woman play by Rani Lukita about a woman
who moves back into her mother’s vagina.

8.35-8.50 Emma & Nay: singer-songwriters

8.50- 9.10 WART: performance art on womyn & mental
health. WART recently performed at Mad Pride, a
performance night by artists living with
schizophrenia, held at the Campbelltown Arts Centre

9.10-9.20 BREAK

9.20-10.00 A cross-cultural discussion on the
womyn’s movements and organizations in Indonesia and
Australia, for which the Secretary General for the
Indonesian National Commission on Violence Against
Women will be joining us to speak of some of the
women-related issues that Indonesia is tackling on a
national scale.

Dinny Jusuf was one of the founders of the grassroots
women’s cooperative: Suara Ibu Peduli (or Voice of
Concerned Mothers in English), during the last
year of the Soeharto dictatorship. She will speak
about the challenges of working for women’s rights in
Indonesia.

Also joining us: Tennah Kpaka from Immigrant Women’s
Speak Out, an organization assisting African women
refugees in Sydney.

The discussion will be moderated by Oishee Alaam,
progressive editor of the UTS student magazine
Vertigo.

10.00-10.30 Closing act: Terra Stylis is an all girl,
all queer hip-hop band will perform a half-hour set on
Wednesday the 25th from 10pm onwards, featuring MC
Zoe, member of Housecat Havoc.

THURS 26th Oct

8pm-8.10pm Edwina Donald, a Sydney-based actress and
opera singer who has performed with Thin Air
productions (among other companies- including Paper
Bag Play Back), will be performing an experimental
short musical piece, in drag.

8.10-8.20 Repeat performance of Cyberspace Whispers

8.20-8.30 Norrie mAy-welby, who has done various
performances of diverse genres, including more
recently with Debbie Doesn’t Do it for Free (at The
Empire Hotel, Erskineville) as well as with Man Jam
(34b Oxford Street). She will be performing a 10
minute blend of kookie musical norrie goodness!

8.30-8.45 Cats in Furs: a blues duo featuring the
Rachel Harris.

8.45-8.55 Zoo: spoken word entitled MILKBRAIN on
Lactation. As body modification, grotesque
spectacle, joyous carnivale, highly gendered sexual
expression, creative act, embodied knowledges,
affirmation of identity...

8.55-9pm Bex and Claudie: Spoken Word

9pm-9.10 BREAK

9.15-10pm DISCUSSION Transgenderism

The knowledgeable Jennifer Germon from the Department
of Gender Studies at the University of Sydney will
engage in a dialogue with norrie mAy-welby, who
through direct experiences of trans-genderism and
trans-sexuality has come to challenge the normative
boundaries of what it means to be a man/woman,
female/male. Norrie is a prolific writer, a
provocative performer, a dedicated social worker and
an all-round terrific human being.

10-10.30pm Melissa Lesnie?

TO BE CONFIRMED: Womyn play-back theatre group: This
is a form of theatre where a particular person’s story
(possibly a member of the audience) is recounted
through a facilitator and then re-enacted live by
members of the cast, accompanied by live music.

Sunday the 29th of October:

FILM NIGHT 7pm-8.30pm
Screening ‘Operation Queer Space’ on the epic journey
of the Wollongong University Queer Collective’s fight
agains homophobia.

Screening will be followed by a talk by the film
maker: Annaliese Constable, queer activist and former
All Sorts member, who was in the thick of the
collective’s campaign.

Publicity
We have secured an interview slot with 2SER for the
purpose of attracting more emerging performers in and
around the Sydney vicinity.

Funding
The concept for this project is very much one that is
based on the premise that the artists and performers
will rely much more on creativity rather than
availability of money to put on their productions. All
participation is volunteer-based.

Buzzz and weeds

2006-10-12T09:42:00.000+10:00

If you missed the church of Kathellisism last night at the Buzzz (not Buzz, BuZZZ) bar (349 King Street, Newtown), well, too bad, you missed the bohême, the glamour, the clamours and the rest ( the bourgeois were exceptionally discreet). It's a bit as if, going to a damn fine restaurant, you had chosen the surimi instead of the mud crab, or instead of the kangaroo fillet, the tofu tartare. Welll... nexxxt chance wednesday fortnight, same place same time, lucky you!)

And that "White Trash" by Adam Hill in the Frolic shop window, 501 King Street! Bliss on branch, as Frogs exclaim.

At the Addison Road Gallery (142 Addison RD Marrickville) this Saturday 14th, between5 and 8 pm, Loris Quantock opens a show of paintings and constructions, and the comedian Rod Quantock will perform with the caustic humour he featured on teevee - before getting the sack for being TOO caustic. This is a free country, right? But can one be THAT free? (Check out Momô's fate in the Greek Theogony by Hesiod...) The show is running till the 29th October.

Also on this Monday 16th October, from 6.30pm at King Street Gallery on Burton, 102 Burton Street, Darlinghurst, "Art with a Heart for the Wayside Chapel" will take place, featuring works by
Adam Cullen
Alan Healy
Andrew Sibley
Camilla Connolly
Cash Brown
Gavin Barbey
Gilles Vancoillie
Heny Mulholland
Jason Wing
John Hawley
Kelly Ann Denton
Leslie Dimmick
Melanie Hill
Michael Leunig
Naomi McCann
Nick Hollo
Paola Talbert
Paul Nagle
Reg Mombassa
Rita Karagel
Russel Carey
Simon Hardy
Wendy Sharpe.

A viewing will be held on Sunday 15th and Monday 16th from 11am to 6pm. Check the details on www.thewaysidechapel.com/auction.

Another exciting event at a longer term is "Sculpture in the Vineyards", opening on the 7th of December (that's Thursday) in three valleys around Sydney. Visit www.sculptureinthevineyards.blogspot.com for more details, and while you're at it, go to www.weedyconnection.com: this website is a fantastic encyclopedia on Australian native plants, their names, characteristics,uses, and their link to the country and to the people who live on it, autochtonous and immigrants.

Drawing in Summer

2006-10-11T07:35:00.000+10:00

This summer, for the first time since its creation in 2002, Alpha House Sketch-Club is running till Christmas. The last session of the year will be on Sunday 18th December 2006, and we'll be back at the easels two weeks afterwards, Sunday 10th January 2007.

Same story for Brandling Street Art Society: last session of the year on Saturday 17th December; first of next year, Monday 4th January. Oh, and they're having a show opening on Friday 24th November 2006, running till Sunday 26th.

So, no Alpha Sketch-Club on the 26th!

Our models for the next eeks are:
15th Oct: Jaqi
22nd Oct: Hank
29th Oct: Gill, back from overseas!
5th Nov: Ole
12th Nov: Anais
19th Nov: Nick or Tania, surprise-package...

***

And now, what's up in Fluffytown? A lot, because it's sprign and sap is overflowing.

On now at the Mori Gallery (168 Day Street, Sydney) till the 4th November,

- a photo-video 'Traditional Knowledge Recording Project' by Sharon Ngallametta and Daniel Bracegirdle, or how to survive in the Bush when you forgot your can-opener.

-'61 Pimlico-181 Hay' by Karron Bridges is a photo-doco, beautiful but not glamourous only, on one of the major industries of Koolmalie (?), a small rural mining town in Oz: Sex. The show was censorad there as not suitable for families!

- 'Peel' by Willurei Kirkbright-Burney deals with the human body, serialisation and the photo reproduction, in a sombre style.

Check it all out on morigallery.com.au.

DO NOT MISS, among the works displayed in Walking the street in south King Street, Newtown, Adam Hill's piece 'White Trash', featuring a bunch of governants faces on the eponym garbage bin. Jubilatory gem!

On the Live side, if you haven't heard the Church of Kathellicism at Succulent, come and enjoy their first gig at the Buzz Bar, 349 King Street, on Wednesdady 11th October (Hey, it's tonight, 7.30 pm!), and each second Wednesday, same place, same time. The gypsie, cabaret-like music performed by a masterful, ever-crowded-with-amazing-guests acoustic band, and the vibrant, over the top presence and voice of Kath Ellis will transport you to Epiphany Land. That's what all the initiates say after their first go.

Opening on Thursday 12th October at Gaffa Gallery (330 Crown Street, Surry Hills), Profile Week III is an overview on what contemporary art the gallery exhibits; and I have a piece in there!

On quite another note, out of the entertainment section,but because under the fluff, one sometimes find body bags, this Saturday at Sydney Town Hall at 10.30 am, there will be a Memorial Ceremony For The Lebanese War Victims. Lest we forget that many Australian family have been devastated by the loss of a lost one in the bombing of a city overseas.

Elfluff.