Garden inspiration

We've been "remodeling" our garden for the last couple of months - first we had the grass removed, well we couldn't really call it grass!

There were plenty of weeds in it, probably more weeds than grass...

I would love to have a native garden with low maintenance plants that don't require a lot of water or time to care for them!
I love succulents and have been collecting them and propagating some of them too, so that I have enough for our garden project...but apart from that my husband and I are a bit of garden novices.

Looking for some inspiration, this past Sunday we visited Zanthorrea Nursery in Maida Vale in the Perth Hills.
Oh what a beautiful place! Everything was so neat, the plants all separated into different zones - ground covers, Kangaroo Paws, Grevilleas, Succulents, Herbs...
Quite enchanting! They even had a kid's playground, garden art...

So many ideas whirling around, now I have to put pen to paper and draw some designs so that we can decide what to buy and where to plant!

Plant your flower seeds now for Spring

How about this wooden frog?

I like this metal ostrich too...

The kids playground in the middle of all the greenery

Grevillea - Pink Pokers - Can you see the bees?

Grevillea

Banksia Spinulosa "Birthday Candles"

Flowers from a Gum tree - another bee inside one of the flowers...

How about this metal Xanthorrhoea or Grass tree (natural to Australia)

Dinosaur and egg

Can you spot the bee?

Sorry I didn't write down names of all the plants....I'll go back for sure when we're ready to start planting.

In an area reserved for staff I saw this cute sign.

Can't wait to see our garden finished, but unfortunately these things take time and a lot of work and money. Maybe by Spring it will be all done hopefully!

2015 Sculpture by the Sea - II -

Following from the previous post, here are a few more sculptures from 11th Sculpture by the Sea exhibition in Cottesloe Beach, Perth.

With 23 artists from 9 different countries and about 70 pieces on show, the sculptures were quite diverse and fun. Well, one could say the Western Australian artists were the majority!


"Water Dreaming" was a collaboration of 3 Aboriginal artists - Shorty Jangala Robertson, Nicole Bailey and Trisha Lee, under the name Warlukurlangu Collaboration - made using 250 pvc balls half buried in the sand, based on the Aboriginal dot paintings.

At the far end you can see the Indiana Tea House building, a popular eating venue at the top and the Surf Lifesavers Club at beach level.

Warlukurlangu Collaboration - "Water Dreaming"

Water Dreaming - seen from the top

Western Australian artist (Addam) Marwah Eid, presented "Cultural complexities of a wandering spirit", made of stainless steel and brass, and draped over the stone walls/steps down to the beach.

Addam Marwah Eid - Cultural complexities of a wandering spirit

Cultural complexities, seen from the top

"Sea Anemone" by New Zealander Rebecca Rose, made with galvanised steel pipe, was very popular with the kids.  

It would look good in my garden too, matching the orange chair covers of my outdoor furniture.

Rebecca Rose - Sea Anemone

Another Western Australian artist, Russell Sheridan, presented "Sisters", with a 2 girls one of them holding a "lamb"? or is it a strange looking dog?, and a few more dogs surrounding them.

"Primordial" by WA artist Tony Davis, was made with Blackbutt and Jarrah woods, resembling the Bungle Bungle range in the Kimberley region of Western Australia as you can see from photo below this one.

Primordial

The real Bungle Bungles beehives (photo from net)

Jimmy Rix from New South Wales presented "Roo Shooter", a reverse of the coin, instead of us shooting them they shoot us?

Keizo Ushio from Japan presented "Oshi Zokei Hexagonal" and at the far end you can see a yellow metal sculpture called "Spline" from WA artist Mark Grey-Smith.

Keizo Ushio - Oshi Zokei hehagonal

Virginia King from New Zealand showed us "Turning stones" made of stainless steel.

                                         

From Japanese sculptor Akiho Tata,  "A breath of fantasia".

Akiho Tata - a breath of fantasia   japan

Another Japanese artist Toshio Iezumi with "m130901" a beautiful piece made with glass, that I wish I could have in my garden too... it might be a bit expensive though... I can imagine the sun rays through this would be amazing!!

Toshio Iezumi - m130901  

"Hearts in Paradise" from Iraqui born/WA artist Ayad Alqaragholli,  who has a few of his signature statues around Perth.

Very much in fashion, recycling an old car into a planter - called "Victory or revenge" by WA artist Tim Burns, this car is planted with grass trees.

Britt Mikkelsen 0f WA, presented another beauty - "Ocean Lace".

Guess how many bottles were used to cover this statue? 1500!!

Made with fibreglass, wheel bearings and bottle tops, covered in a special chameleon paint that changes colour according to the angle. Called "For the love of sculpture" by WA Claire Davenhall.

Yuku Takahashi from WA, "Way of the Wind" a lot of little flags in the wind.

Danish sculptor, Keld Mosehold presented " Is this a step forward" - 3 men walking with a book in their hands.

Kevin Draper of WA, with a metal piece called "Penelope".

                                                                     Kevin Draper - Penelope  

Some art works are self-explanatory, others are a bit vague, some names suit the piece, others don't have much meaning, to me anyway. But artists are artists...

With so many pieces it's hard to pick a favourite, but I would go with the slender glass piece "m130901".

As I was leaving the beach I saw this striking vintage VW Kombi and remembered how years ago when living in Germany we used to own an orange one that had been transformed into a camping van. Good times we had travelling through Europe!!

Returning to the Beach - 2015 Sculpture by the Sea

With much needed rain falling today and tomorrow, it's certainly no time for a visit to the beach...but these photos were actually taken in March just after my arrival from Amsterdam.

That weekend of the 21st and 22nd March would be my last chance to visit the 2015 Sculpture by the Sea exhibition in Cottesloe Beach, so even though I still felt jet-lagged and quite tired I drove the 20 odd kms to the beach.

Being the last days of the exhibition, the exhibits were surrounded by people, there were actually more people on the sand than in the sea - so most of my photos have people in them.

Still, it was a worthwhile visit to once again see so much talent and ingenuity displayed in such a beautiful setting like the beach.

Norton Flavel -  Lucky Country

The piece above by Australian artist Norton Flavel, of a ball and chain, entitled "Lucky country" won the Western Australia Sculptor Scholarship award of $10,000 to be shared with Kim Perrier, a Canadian born/Australian resident artist, who exhibited the piece entitled "Ashes to Ashes" a burnt tree with carved figures (next photo).

The "Lucky Country" was also chosen by the Town of Cottesloe to be added to their collection, probably to be exhibited somewhere in Cottesloe in the near future.

Norton Flavel also had a popular entry in last's year exhibition with the "Bulk Carrier" an oversized wine cask. You can see his sculpture in this blog post.

Kim Perrier - Ashes to Ashes

Detail of "Ashes to ashes"

The People's Choice Award of $2,500 was awarded to Chinese sculptor Wendi Zhang for her collection of a flock of huge red Flamingos, entitled "Mi No 5".  Not sure about that title, why no 5 when there were at least 10 flamingos?

Wendi Zhang - Mi No 5

The flock of flamingos

Perth street artist Stormie Mills, won the Children's Choice Award with a pink gigantic rabbit entitled "The stormie mills project".

You can see some of Stormie Mills street artist work in this post about last year's Form.

Stormie Mills - "The stormie mills project"

The giant pink rabbit at the beginning of the pier

There were a lot of giant statues this year from grown men to babies.

Chinese artist Chen Wenling 's "Harbour" is similar to the red piece (Childhood morning) he exhibited in 2012 and also the one exhibited in 2013 of a man on his head with a child on his feet. Not sure about the name though...

Chen Wenling - Harbour

Chzec sculptor David Cherny, exhibited 3 giant crawling babies entitled "Babies three pieces".

Thai artist Naidee Changmoh presented "The ascetic" below.

I had to look up the meaning of "ascetic" as I'd never heard it before - but it means recluse, solitary, celibate, spartan, puritan, monk. 

Naidee Chanmoh - The ascetic

Chinese artist Wang Shugang work of art consisted of statues of men sitting on balls entitled 
"Men on Ball". It rather reminds me of "See no evil", "speak no evil" and "hear no evil", only there were 5 statues of men here and not only 3.

Wang Shugang - Man on ball

Soon I'll post some more photos of other sculptures that I enjoyed at this years Sculpture by the Sea.

Which one was your favourite?

Sunday, 22nd March 2015