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By the river

31 Monday Aug 2015

Posted by morselsandscraps in Moruya, photos

≈ 8 Comments

Tags

Deua River, frogs, gold processing, lotus pads, mangroves

Suddenly I have two hours unbespoke in my shopping town as I wait for the car to be serviced. I slide-walk down a grassy slope, water-dense after recent rain, and pass the old corrugated iron boatshed on the bank of the Deua River. The river is running fast and catching clouds. There are bright sun-spots where the mangrove pneumatophores meet the water. A man in a motorised wheelchair taking his dog for a walk murmurs hello. I stand in the gazebo near the lotus and water lily pond, which is bordered by desiccation. But the pool is loud with frogs, including the woody clack of what I think is a pobblebonk frog.


The river looks tranquil, idyllic and unperturbed, but there is danger afoot. A mining company is seeking approval for a cyanide gold-processing plant in its headwaters. Local residents are concerned about spillages and pollution of the river and the water table: the company doesn’t have an unblemished record, and one small accident would be a disaster. Already one orchardist in Araluen has bulldozed 250,000 peach and nectarine trees: that’s three full time jobs gone and a lot of seasonal work – J used to prune, thin and pick there before he retired. There is a potential threat to the town water supply for parts of the Eurobodalla shire; concern about the future of market gardeners who grow and sell organic at the Tuesday afternoon farmers’ markets in Moruya; implications for the health of Batemans Marine Park, off the coast where the Deua River meets the sea. I have long been mystified and angered by the power mining companies seem to wield. They rape, pillage and pollute and then disappear with the profits, leaving the local community and environment permanently scarred.

Posted with BlogsyPosted with Blogsy

Frogs

22 Wednesday Oct 2014

Posted by morselsandscraps in confession

≈ 8 Comments

Tags

frogs, me painting

Dare I blog this? It's the kind of self-exposure I didn't expect a blog – or a friend – to demand of me. Yesterday, Loretta nudged me into painting rather than writing at Middle Earth, and she's hard to resist.

Before I knew where I was, a page had been sliced from my pad of canvasses, a sketch of a frog was plopped in front of me, I'd taken a sponge, dipped it in dobs of green and white acrylic, and created a background. Loretta whisked this away to dry and handed me a pencil. “Now, sketch a frog. Copy that one”, indicating a pencil sketch in a copy of Artist's palette. I shuddered and obeyed. My attempts were all out of proportion and the toes were pointy. So I practised frog toes all over my piece of paper, gradually getting them rounded, although padded was beyond my skill. Soon the page was filled with disembodied feet, and a congregation of distorted frog-bodies.

My splotchy background reappeared in front of me, accompanied by a piece of chalk. This was beginning to look like commitment. My job now was to transfer the pencil distortions onto the painted surface. Chalk is a forgiving medium and I was content with the blurry white outlines on green.

But my task mistress wasn't. “Now you paint them, Meg.” I tried not to see painting as colouring in and to remember to hold my fine paintbrush side on: a darker green first, a bit of white for frog-forehead and frog-mouth, red for frog-eyes. A pause, and then a fiddle with yellow for frog-bellies. My mentor's comment? “You can only get better”!

When I returned home the strain showed. I was garaging the car, singing inanely “I'm a frog! I'm a frog! I'm a frog!” when I realised my next door neighbour was on the other side of the bushes.

As I reflected on my day, I was glad I'd been given frog as a subject. Now I have frogs on canvas, and their image can't be “truthed” because I never see them, although they've been in full voice in puddles and creeks as I walk around after rain.

And that was my first attempt at painting on canvas with acrylic. I'll take three weeks off now, to gather strength for the next phase.

 

 

 

 

 

Posted with BlogsyPosted with Blogsy

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