Sunday 24 February 2019

Statuary Friday in Adelaide

Because of the time difference it is still Friday in Adelaide, so I went for a walk this afternoon to see the statues of Adelaide. It's been a lovely, lovely day and I am genuinely baffled and kicking myself that I didn't think to give myself the treat of a couple of extra days here, if only to wallow in that beautiful feeling which you only get to have the first time that you visit each Australian city, of simultaneously understanding everything and also knowing that you don't know where you are or what's happening. It's beautiful because it throws everything you know and take for granted about your place in the world into a state of provisionality. But because Adelaide is so reasonably proportioned and laid out you can enjoy this condition to the full in the knowledge that you are not really lost.

Anyway, the statuary. I didn't have much charge on my phone so I allowed myself only one photograph of each statue I came to. Let us rejoice.



This is beside the Catholic cathedral on Wakefield Street. I stopped into the church for a bit and Mass was on. It is done differently in South Australia to Victoria, evidently, because the priest was talking about how he had the blood of our lord Jesus Christ in this Tardis (holding up a cup). In Victoria they call it a chalice. But he said it is a Tardis. I don't care either way, and you know what, it's not even blood and it would be disgusting, and no doubt criminal, if it really was. So I was like, fine man, whatever, call it a Tardis if that's what your local traditions and folkways require you to do.

After that I crossed into Victoria Square.



I like Victoria's skirt. Considering it's bronze it's surprising how much it looks like taffeta. Also I am quite into ruffles at the moment. All the clothing on all the portrait statues I saw today was interestingly made



This is Charles Cameron Kingston (nice braid on the coat tails [not shown])



John McDouall Stuart (Cool pants and robe)



Charles Sturt (so much less anxious-making to look at statues with hats on than statues without hats when it is 37 degrees)

Brief lapse of concentration occurred here and I because distracted by the enigmatic window treatments in this building in King William Street.





This glass-fronted display box by the main entrance of the building had a dark blue towel pressed in there, which is not something I have seen done before. I have not particularly been looking at what is standard practice in these circumstances, but still. Well, after reflecting on and in this I walked up Rundle Mall and made my way past a number of small and quirky pieces of shopper-friendly public art.



Pigs being happy and eating out of a bin. Pigs, cows, sheep, chooks - so frequently pressed into service as cheerful and friendly subjects for public art - people must really like seeing happy and contented animals, it's almost as if we've got a guilty conscience about them. Or something.



'The Slide' (not resembling any slide I've ever been on, or seen, but this is why we travel, right? to experience other cultures.)



Two large polished silver orbs.



This man is in a grassy quad next to Bonython Hall at the University of Adelaide. There is a Fringe bar in there today so I had a very thymey local gin with tonic and enjoyed the really nice work the sculptor has done with the back of the man's frock coat and stovepipe trousers.



Continuing westward along North Terrace, here's another important personage. His name and CV is on the massive fucking chunk of granite there. If you bother to look him up and it transpires that he ever did anything interesting, please let me know.



This fellow was the first donor to the university, so he got a chair to sit on.



Not sure this is statuary, but it might be a statue of an alien life form, or indeed it might be an actual alien life form not a representation of one. It's nice whatever it is



Obligatory Burns.



I don't remember who this is, either (sorry - the gin, remember, and it was hot today) but I can tell you that when you do as directed and Press, nothing happens.



Edward VII and his sublunary Graces.





Two bad photogaphs of the Great War memorial which I spent a lot of time looking closely at because it is extraordinarily interesting, I really think not just to me but to anyone interested in monuments.

Matthew Flinders - a whole lot better than the one we have in Melbourne. Both Flinderses belong to the epoch when it was not considered witty to also include the cat



Mary Lee.



Exquisite portrait of Roma Mitchell



Also exquisite, in a completely different way, equestrian bronze memorial to the South African war. I have not seen a better example anywhere in Australia of an equestrian statue executed without embarrassment in a demotic local style. The soldier looks Australian (although technically he is British) and so, somehow, does the horse.



Back to Melbourne tomorrow. 






4 comments:

ernmalleyscat said...

Quite the tour. They have a lot of them over there. I looked up Sir Samuel James Way and before all the honorifics he was Sam Way and famous for selling cleaning products door to door.

lucy tartan said...

yes, yes, of course he was. OF COURSE.

Really I am trying right now to write about something else so of course i did look him up, and I very much enjoyed the way the writer of this page* about him on a website called SA History Hub (which I'm sure is full of interesting stuff but on the evidence of that one page it is being relentlessly sucked into the eyeless chthonic maw of Family History Researching) has got in there an excellent commentary on the way this Samuel Way got into all his impressive jobs by being ready to pounce, over & over again, when someone else had just snuffed it. I was also pleased to learn that the first of these superiors to die thus paving Sam's Way to the top was someone called Alfred Aktinson, presumably the inventor of Akta-Vite.

*http://sahistoryhub.com.au/people/sir-samuel-james-way-bart-pc I don't know how to put it in html, also nobody actually cares so that's fine

ernmalleyscat said...

Standing on the shoulders of the giant of Akta Vite must have felt a bit substituty as it always seemed less fun than Milo because it was meant to be healthier or cheaper or something.

Helen Balcony said...

I wonder whether any of these are Louis Laumen or Lis Johnston sculptures. They do most of the lost wax brass statuary in Melbourne. Have a look at this gobsmackingly awe inspiring work by Louis next time you are in Canberra (Anzac Parade)
https://www.facebook.com/helen.smart.583/posts/10157402132426554