Archive for February 2010


Godbye Kerb Coffee *sniff*

February 25th, 2010 — 12:27am

Over the past few months we’ve seen more and more vacancies amongst the local retailers.  Our end of Oxford street has become populated with For Lease signs and there are fewer new shops opening up in the area.  The local realtors and landlords seem to be ignoring the fact that nobody can afford the exorbitant rents being charged in our area.

After months of watching this cycle of rents being raised, tenants moving out, new tenants moving in, rents being raised, tenants moving out, and so on we’ve finally lost one of the businesses the community loved and relied on.

Goodbye Greg, you’ll be missed, as will the best coffee in the Eastern Suburbs.

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my last coffee from Kerb

My last Kerb Coffee.

1 comment » | issues, Photography, the traps

It’s just not cricket

February 23rd, 2010 — 8:02pm

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Comment » | Australianess, Piffle, Uncategorized

Bondi Tonight

February 22nd, 2010 — 6:36am

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1 comment » | Australianess, Photography

“We are prone to judge success by the index of our salaries or the size of our automobiles, rather than by the quality of our service relationship to humanity.”

February 21st, 2010 — 6:23pm

– MLK Jr.

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Comment » | Australianess, Photography

Hey Ramos! Quit lounging around.

February 18th, 2010 — 11:39pm

That’s what I named this donkey.

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Comment » | Austral, Palling 'Round

First Impressions. . .

February 18th, 2010 — 11:35pm

I did a little commercial work in Austral, found it interesting, so I’ve been back a couple times. Here are some shots from yesterday. Felt like a bit of a calm before the storm.

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Comment » | Austral, Photography, the traps

Austral

February 18th, 2010 — 11:28pm

I enrolled at the Sydney College of the Arts on Monday, to do a Masters of Documentary Photography, here’s my thesis proposal:

Going West; Sydney’s Swelling Borders and Population

Planning for population growth has been a struggle in Sydney since the first fleet arrived.  Limited resources, land that was untenable and a hostile climate were the original conspirators against the British colonials.  Today’s planning issues have more to do with transportation, resource distribution and emerging racial tensions.  Nowhere is this more evident than in Austral, a semi-rural, socio-economically disadvantaged town on Sydney’s South West edge.

Sydney’s population has grown at an average rate of 40,000 per year over the last 30 years[1] and as such has had to expand its borders significantly.  Bounded by ocean to the east and national park to the north and south, the population has had to expand west, towards the Blue Mountains.  Suburb after suburb have been created and built up, not only as a reflection of a growing local population, but representative of a worldwide trend.  As Sydney’s housing prices rise, those without wealth are forced further and further out of the centre of the city[2].

Austral is a suburb that is representative of the development that his occurring all over Australia, and the world.  Austral rests at the junction of two major motorways and has seen a rapid increase in population.  The township is at a crossroads, both geographically and metaphorically.  Much of the surrounding land is still rural farmland.  Vast green plains full of crops, but encroaching on one side are developments and a changing cultural identity.  Buddhist temples and Mosques are amongst the first signs of the racially diverse population that are infiltrating the traditionally Caucasian-Australian area.


View Larger Map

My project will examine these interactions, both personal, and material.  I will look at the way the homogenised global society is finding its way into once rural Australia, the continuum of culture that represents Australia’s identity and the changing face of Sydney’s landscape as a result of development.


[1]http://www.metrostrategy.nsw.gov.au/dev/uploads/paper/introduction/BACKGROUND%20ANALYSIS-3.html

[2] Australian Bureau of Statistics, Information Paper: An Introduction to Socio-Economic Indexes for Areas (SEIFA), 2006 (cat. no. 2039.0)

1 comment » | Australianess, Photography

There is something to be learned from a rainstorm. When meeting with a sudden shower, you try not to get wet and run quickly along the road. By doing such things as passing under the eaves of houses, you still get wet. When you are resolved from the beginning, you will not be perplexed, though you will still get the same soaking. This understanding extends to all things.

February 15th, 2010 — 12:56am

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Comment » | Photography, Piffle, Travel

Charlie’s Merc

February 15th, 2010 — 12:38am

It popped a hose after squash.  He manned up and fixed it.

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Comment » | Palling 'Round

North

February 15th, 2010 — 12:26am

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Comment » | Piffle, the traps

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