Preparation

Love Letters opens next week - we are working on the detail: of the set, the props, the lights, the delivery of certain lines, the timing of the music.

Michael Sparks as Andy and Andrea Close as Melissa in rehearsal for Love Letters

After long days of work and rehearsals, I had a night off, in which Him Outdoors made me lamb shanks and green veg for dinner. I know the meat came in a pre-cooked packet from the supermarket, but it was still a great treat, and the kittens shared the evening in too. 

I have been preparing a workshop for my team to come to Canberra. As part of the two-day event I ran a session on our organisation's values and what they meant to us as individuals and a team. As part of that session, I took them to the National Portrait Gallery where we all chose an artwork of a person who we felt represented those values, and shared our findings with the group. I walked around the gallery and picked some of my favourites. 

Dr Brown and Green Old Time Waltz (1983) by Harold Thornton

Bob Brown, environmental activist, was the first Parliamentary Leader of the Australian Greens. Brown studied medicine at the University of Sydney before moving to Tasmania and working as a general practitioner in Launceston. In 1976, having taken a rafting trip down the Franklin River, he became a founding member of the Wilderness Society. From then until 1983 he led the campaign against proposed dam works on the Franklin, which was subsequently preserved with a World Heritage Listing. n 1983, he began a decade in the Tasmanian House of Assembly as the member for Denison. He was elected to the Federal Senate as a member of the Tasmanian Greens in 1996 and later co-founded the Australian Greens, which he guided from a fringe to a mainstream political force before resigning from the leadership in 2012. That year he established the Bob Brown Foundation, a not-for-profit organisation supporting environmental causes.

Harold Thornton travelled to Tasmania in December 1982 to join Brown and the 6,000 protestors blocking the construction of the Franklin Dam. Thornton painted this portrait of Brown while he was in the wilderness campsite and in his Hobart and Sydney studios. Despite its fanciful elements, this painting provides a faithful record of the Franklin blockade. It was a finalist for the 1983 Archibald Prize. 

Patrick Dodson (2004) by Zhou Xiaoping

Patrick Dodson, senator for Western Australia, is a Yawuru man who was born in Broome but spent most of his childhood in the Northern Territory. Orphaned in 1960, in 1961 he was sent (with his brother, Mick) to Monivale College in Victoria. In 1975 he became Australia's first Aboriginal Catholic priest, but left the priesthood in the early 1980s. As director of the Central Land Council, he was integral to negotiations for the return of the Uluru Kata- Tjuta National Park to traditional owners in 1985. In 1989 he was a commissioner of the Royal Commission into Aboriginal Deaths in Custody, and in 1991 he became the first chairperson of the Council for Aboriginal Reconciliation. From 2012 to 2012 Dodson co-chaired the expert panel on the constitutional recognition of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander peoples. He was the inaugural director of the Indigenous Policy, Dialogue and Research Unit at the University of New South Wales and is the first Indigenous Australian to be appointed to the council of the Australian National University.

Zhou Xiaoping met Dodson in 2002 at the funeral for artists Jimmy Pike, whose widow helped arrange a portrait sitting. "We spent half a day together and I did a number of sketches of him , painting with Chinese ink and brushes on large rice paper,' Zhou says. Back in Melbourne, he mounted the painting on canvas and later added a layer of acrylic and oil paint.

Charles Teo (2011) by Adam Chang

Charles Teo AM is a neurosurgeon. Born in Sydney (1975), he graduated in medicine and surgery from the University of New South Wales and worked in the USA at the Children's Medical Centre, Dallas and at the University of Arkansas. After returning home he worked at Sydney's Prince of Wales Private Hospital, establishing a reputation in the field of minimally-invasive neurosurgery and becoming known for performing radical surgery on tumours other surgeons considered inoperable. While some of his patients think him a miracle worker, Teo's approach has attracted condemnation within the medical profession, resulting in recent investigations by the NSW Medical Council and the Health Care Complaints Commission. Teo has been a visiting professor at more than 50 universities and hospitals worldwide, and the Cure for Life Foundation, which he formed in 2003, is the leading founder of brain cancer research in Australia.

Adam Change (Hong Jun Zhang), born in Shanghai, migrated to Australia in 1997 and has been an Archibald Prize finalist six times. In 2011 the animal-protection organisation Voiceless staged a fundraising event in which participants could win a commissioned portrait by Chang. Published Eleonora Triguboff won the prize and initiated this portrait of Charles Teo, who served on the Voiceless council from 2009 to 2015.

Fred Hollows (1993) by Kerrie Lester

After completing his specialist training in England and Wales, in 1965 Professor Fred Hollows AC became Associate Professor of Ophthalmology at the University of New South Wales. Soon afterwards he began investigating eye disease in Aboriginal communities. Throughout the 1970s and 1980s he pioneered treatments of trachoma and other eye diseases that have halved the incidence of curable blindness in Aboriginal populations. He also established successful eye treatment schemes overseas, notably in Nepal and Eritrea. The gruff doctor was Australian of the Year in 1990 and was accorded a State funeral following his death from cancer three years later. The Fred Hollows Foundation continues his work, spearheaded by his widow, Gabi Hollows. 

Kerrie Lester's bold and distinctive portraits, in which the outlines of the sitters are hand-stitched, were contenders for the Archibald Prize at least sixteen times. This portrait of Hollows was made when he was dying. In a 2013 Derivan artist talk, Lester said, 'He always had a pipe hanging out the corner of his mouth. I like to paint beyond what I see of the person, their mannerisms and the way they stand and the way they hold their head and the way they move.' 

Cathy Freeman (1999) by Kerrie Lester

Cathy Freeman OAM won the 400m Olympic Gold medal in front of her home crowd in Sydney 2000, famously carrying both the Australian and the Aboriginal flags on her victory lap. Born in Mackay, Queensland, her mother is of the Kuk Yalanji people and her father was of the Burri Gubba people. Aged sixteen, Freeman was selected for the Australian women's 4 x 100m relay team that won the gold medal at the Commonwealth Games in Auckland. She won two more gold medals at the Commonwealth Games in Canada in 1994 with victories in the 200m and 400m. The first Aboriginal track and field athlete to represent Australia at the Olympic Games, she won a silver medal in the 400m in Atlanta in 1996. She was ranked first in the world in her signature event, in which she won back-to-back World Championships in 1997 and 1999. After her retirement in 2003, she established the Cathy Freeman Foundation, which continues to enhance educational opportunities for Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander children in remote communities.

Known for her playful, textured, highly-coloured works, Kerrie Lester's style is well suited to the unpretentious personality of her powerful sitter. Lester worked on the portrait during breaks in Freeman's training schedule prior to the Sydney Olympics. 

I then took my team to the top of Mt Ainslie to show them the view of Canberra below. I extended a metaphor about seeing the big picture and gaining new perspective from regarding things from a different aspect. It was also a good excuse to get out into the fresh air. 

Work team at Mt Ainslie

We were busy at the weekend - rehearsals and such - and I was quite exhausted so there was no time to go far afield for my trig bagging. Fortunately, we have Mt Painter practically on our doorstep so we went for a walk up there before breakfast. 

Reconciliation Day celebrations

It's Reconciliation Day in the ACT. To reflect on this wonderful country and how we were welcomed here by the indigenous people, I went for a walk up Mt Ainslie to breathe in the air and appreciate the beauty of this place. I am on he land of the Ngunnawal people, and I acknowledge their continued connection to country and culture. I pay my respects to their elders: past; present and emerging.

Black cockatoos in the trees

Meanwhile, Him Outdoors ran a race in the glorious scenery. He went the right way; the crosses on the tracks indicate the wrong way.

We celebrated the end of the day with bubbles because, well, why not?

Walks over the next couple of days revealed beautiful skies and scenic surrounds.

All that walking requires energy, especially if there are rehearsals as well. Fortunately General Philosopher was on the case and made us all this lime green jelly slice. 

Throughout everything we are judged, as always, by Melantho of the Pretty Cheeks.

New Horizons

After a work meeting in town I went for a walk up Mt Ainslie with Leaky Lyn. The views from up there are expansive, with the lake and avenues laid out beneath the ever-changing skies.

I feel like I keep posting pictures of food, but I'm not really going to make any apologies for that when the meals are as good as they were at 1882 Bar & Grill on our weekly date night (good choice by Him Outdoors).

Salt and pepper calamari

Pork tenderloin wrapped with prosciutto, apple puree, crispy black fungus mushrooms and red wine jus

Hoisin duck pizza

As a big winter treat to ourselves, we bought brand new mountain bikes. Our last ones have served us well for the past 20+ years, but now we feel we are ready to upgrade. Behold my first ever dual suspension mountain bike!

As part of the Canberra Writers Festival I attended an interview with Clare Wright, talking about her latest book, You Daughters of Freedom. It was fascinating and inspiring and so I bought a copy of the book and asked her to sign it for me, which she did.

Her book focuses on stories of five women who helped to win the vote for Australian women; Dora Meeson Coates, Vida Goldstein, Nellie Martel, Muriel Matters and Dora Montefiore were once household names, and Clare Wright argues that they should be again. As part of the discussion, the Centenary of Women's Suffrage Fountain was mentioned, so I went to have a look at it afterwards. 

In 2002, Senator Amanda Vanstone launched a design competition for a memorial to mark the centenary of the passing of the Commonwealth Franchise Act in 1902, which granted the right to vote to white Australian women over 21 years of age. The winning design (by Sydney artists Jennifer Turpin and Michaelie Crawford) was an 18-metre tall red steel structure in a fan design with rotating blades, and was to be located prominently on the lawns between the Old and New Parliament Houses.

The contract was cancelled in 2003 due to a number of reasons, one of which was public and media controversy over the placement of the memorial in such a prominent location. Several people complained that it would block the view of The War Memorial; the crown jewel of Australia's monuments. 

Instead of the grand design, a fountain was approved. It is a nice fountain, positioned round the back of Old Parliament House 'by the bins'.  The Australian War Memorial received funding of $500 million, and Australia spent more on celebrating the centenary of WWI than all of the other Allied Nations put together. There is a clear argument that modern funding is masculine, which was made far better than I am transcribing here. But this story does not reflect well on gender equality. 

The fountain was designed by Cate Riley and Andrew Smith of the National Capital Authority, and comprises a rectangular shape with six jets on either side and a weir at one end. The border of the pool carries text commemorating the passage of the Commonwealth Franchise Act, and of the election of the following year - the first election in which women were allowed to stand for office and to vote. 

The fountain is embedded with mosaic tiles (created by Mary Stuart), and a walkway leading away from the fountain describes the achievements of women in the Federal Parliament of Australia. Sure, it's nice, but it all feels a bit low-key and underwhelming, especially in comparison to the male mausoleum on the other side of the lake. We are still being 'put in our place'.

The next day I went to another talk called Behind Closed Doors, with Domestic Violence as its subject matter. The panelists were Karen Viggers, Father Rod Bower, Phil Barker and Jane Gilmore, and it was moderated by Virginia Haussegger. This also filled my mind with thoughts (some of which I shall share on my other blog) and my bag with books. 

Since 1938, 133 Australians have been killed by terrorism. More than half of that number of women will be killed in the home this year. On average one woman a week in Australia is killed by a partner or former partner. These are devastating statistics. We need to talk about them; we need to think about ways in which we can help. And as long as we are prepared to communicate; there can be progress. We have to believe in new beginnings; we have to hope for change and regrowth; we have to have faith in the resilience and the rightness of nature. Or we have nothing.