Art and Health

The journey of a thousand steps has began.

Christmas-time in Australia.

Is one of those rare moments in the year when I fully embrace being in Australia and crave the opportunity and freedom to completely immerse myself in all its natural elements and euphermal beauty... a land of clear blue horizons, rugged wind swept and inspiring mountains, red soil, expansive meadows, and deep deep blue seas. 

Wishing for a peaceful, joyful and gracious Christmas and long balmy Summer nights.

May 2014 be a time to fulfil long-held dreams.

With love,

Jules

100 days

So he wrote and asked me to consider what I would do if I just had 100 days...

Much much more of the same... and I would strive to be less preoccupied. I would aim to accept the things that I can not change. I would allow myself to live guided by my heart more, and give myself unconditional permission to play and fly. 

Western Health

I am exactly where I need to be right now..

..right in the middle of it all and loving it.

Derby Day...

Hofesh Schechter

Sun...

Shechter is a magnificent, one-of-a-kind choreographer. The movement in Sun is complex and gorgeous, weaving extremely disparate physical languages into seamless, tightly-woven phrases. Lindy hop, 18th and 19th century classical ballet, belly dancing, Balkan circle, MTV-style group choreography, mystic dances and religious gestures are all in evidence.

Sun bypasses both quiet contemplation and intellectual analysis – it is experienced directly as an unrelenting series of visceral stimuli; the audience perched, breathless. The parts, however, exceed the whole. While much of contemporary dance remains abstracted, Shechter forces his choreographies to assume an overtly narrative form, but has yet to do so entirely satisfactorily.The piece is interesting in terms of form: it opens with a cheeky preview of the end, "so you know where this is going and that it's all going to be OK", then launches into a furious barrage of short episodes, some merely seconds long, which brainstorm situations. These range from the genteel and aristocratic, to religious, romantic and graphically violent, closing with a peculiar scene of plaintive sheep in the field, facing a fox. The scene repeats, this time as an indigenous person faces a European coloniser, and suddenly a very heavy silence descends on the auditorium.

Sun by Hofesh Schecter UK Dance company

The Dance Floor and the Balcony

Ronald Heifetz is the King Hussein bin Talal Senior Lecturer in Public Leadership at Harvard University’s John F. Kennedy School of Government. For the past twenty years, he has generated critical works that have influenced leadership theory in every domain. Heifetz often draws on the metaphor of the dance floor and the balcony.Let’s say you are dancing in a big ballroom. . . . Most of your attention focuses on your dance partner, and you reserve whatever is left to make sure you don’t collide with dancers close by. . . . When someone asks you later about the dance, you exclaim, “The band played great, and the place surged with dancers.”But, if you had gone up to the balcony and looked down on the dance floor, you might have seen a very different picture. You would have noticed all sorts of patterns. . . you might have noticed that when slow music played, only some people danced; when the tempo increased, others stepped onto the floor; and some people never seemed to dance at all. . . . the dancers all clustered at one end of the floor, as far away from the band as possible. . . . You might have reported that participation was sporadic, the band played too loud, and you only danced to fast music.. . .The only way you can gain both a clearer view of reality and some perspective on the bigger picture is by distancing yourself from the fray. . . .If you want to affect what is happening, you must return to the dance floor.*So you need to be both among the dancers and up on the balcony. That’s where the magic is, going back and forth between the two, using one to leverage the other.

Heifetz, R., and Linsky, M. Leadership on the Line: Staying Alive Through the Dangers of Leading. Boston: Harvard Business School Press, 2002.

..and so again he contacts me

Receiving another email from him tonight was not exciting, it was illuminating.

Essentially he wrote much the same as before. Filled with self absorbed and emotionally stunted expressions.

His words left me feeling indifferent.

Later in the evening as I reflected on what he had written, I began to feel the uncomfortable realisation of the truth and it created a sinking feeling in the pit of my stomach. This man probably never loved me. Not in the way I want and need to be loved. I honored, cherished and continued to believe in our love story, like a plant thirsty for the morning dew... and for what? I have given him and this story a lot of my energy and hope.

Thoughts continue... I was misguided, and naive. Despite whatever promises he may have made, he is a broken man..I now truly understand how differently we see the world and our place in it...that sinking feeling makes me want to curl into a ball and hide..Can't imagine even going back to Firenze. I never want to see him again.

One thing I know. I am not pleased to have had my heart broken but I am thankful to be free.

It is, what it is.

I believe that God works in mysterious ways. Countless times over the last six years I have cried myself to sleep hoping, praying, yearning for the man I loved and I to find a way to be together and to create a future together. Last year, after we parted at Verona in Italy, the days that followed were etched in a blurry haze of tears, grief and darkness. I couldn't make sense of anything. I thought my prayers and intentions had been misplaced and I couldn't understand how there could be another way forward.

For the first time since we met, for over 12 months we have not exchanged a word. Then out-of-the-blue, I recently received an unexpected email from him. It was nonchalant, non-maleficent, non-committal and devoid of any affection and charm. He wrote that he would like to travel to Australia and New Zealand next Summer and suggested that I may like to join him. 

In the days that followed emotions varied, peaked and finally plateaued. 

Initially I was bewildered by his email, then surprised by the absence of any remorse or reference to our last time together, next I slide into fantastical imaginings of seeing him again and what I'd wear, and then finally once I had recouped the memories and sensations of our last time together, my response became very clear. I no longer love or trust him and so there is nothing for me to gain by seeing him again. 

It has taken me a long time to come to this realisation, and it is without regret, bitterness, sadness or any emotion. It is simply what I believe now to be the truth.

Cherry Tree Lane

Gay Gough Theatre at Mt Clear College

Cherry Tree Lane: the Mary Poppins Story has been written by Curtain Call Performing Arts Studios owner Lindy Procaccino. Acacia was one of the most beautiful actors in the group and it was a real thrill to go to be present to watch her perform. 

Inspiring story line, in particular the chorus "Try to defy gravity, so to be able to fly"

A Kind of Fabulous Hatred

A Kind of Fabulous HatredBy Barry Dickins, Directed by Laurence Strangio

A one-woman fantasy about Sylvia Plath, performed by Caroline Lee.

A Kind of Fabulous Hatred by Barry Dickins is a new Australian work: beautifully written, surprising, and darkly humorous. Set on the night of the poet Sylvia Plath’s suicide, A Kind of Fabulous Hatred is a complex, insightful and often very funny portrait of a mind in turmoil. The poet is presented as a figure in thrall to language and meaning – weaving it, flitting across it, riffing on it, avoiding it.

Language is her salvation and her release – it is also her entrapment: the clock ticks away her final moments while the storm rages outside and in.

Lee and Strangio “invite audiences into unfamiliar landscapes where we may experience new ways of seeing, examine the fissures and fractures of our own inner lives, and chart the seldom mapped interiority of strangers.”  - Peta Murray, Playwright.

Winner of RE Ross Trust Scriptwriting Award 2011.

'The Last Day at Giverny' Monet's Garden, NGV

Céleste Boursier-Mougenot

Céleste Boursier-Mougenot is a French artist and composer who creates large-scale acoustic installations and environments which draw upon forces of nature and the rhythms of everyday life to produce new forms of art and music. 

With clinamen 2013, white porcelain bowls float upon an intensely blue pool. Circulating gently, swept along by submarine currents, floating crockery acts as percussive instruments, creating a resonant, chiming acoustic soundscape, marked by complexity, hidden patterns and chance compositions. In its unification of colour, sound and space, clinamen encourages a form of multi-sensory or ‘synaesthetic’ engagement with the work of art. 

Working in a tradition established by American composer John Cage, Boursier-Mougenot’s installation promotes chance and indeterminacy in musical composition, as well as the use of unorthodox musical instruments.

Sound Bites City

The inaugural exhibition of RMIT University's new Sound Art Collection.

Sound Bites City will showcase the new RMIT University Sound Art Collection - the first of its kind in Australia – and offer audiences the chance to experience 19 new and significant works by leading Australian and international sound artists.

The exhibition takes place in the Torus - an exciting circular structure that has been specially designed by architects, engineers and sound designers based in RMIT's SIAL unit to provide the best way to exhibit sound.

The Torus will take up the entire main gallery, with overlapping 'boughs' of red cedar forming a canopy around a thin fabric skin - it will be an airy shell, a sonic tunnel, a pioneering spacio-acoustic marvel constructed by RMIT architecture and design students.

The immersive sounds experienced inside the Torus will introduce audiences to works especially commissioned by, or acquired from, artists from Australia, Canada, UK, Germany, US, and France.

Visitors are invited to stroll through a 16 channel speaker system, finishing on a raised mini landscape where they can relax on the faux lawn while enjoying the best aural vantage point to hear the works.

Audiences will also have the opportunity to browse through any part of the Collection on headphones, and to watch the composition of a work in progress.

A unique addition to Australian culture, this is the first dedicated sound art collection in an Australian university. For over two years RMIT Gallery has worked closely with sound and design researchers at the University to select the inaugural works and develop an exhibition platform for spatial electroacoustic sound works.

The Collection includes 2010 Turner Prize winner Susan Philipsz’s We’ll All Go Together, leading Australian sound artists Sonia Leber and David Chesworth’s Sydney Olympic Park Commission 5000 Calls, and the pioneering Bill Fontana’s KirribilliWharf.

There will also be scheduled performances of work by Steve Stelios Adam, Philip Brophy, Christophe Charles, Bill Fontana, Katrin Isabel Ernst, Susan Frykberg, Christine Groult, Sonia Leber and David Chesworth, Nick Murray and Carl Anderson, Susan Philipsz, Douglas Quin, Stephan Schütze, Daniel Teruggi, Horacio Vaggione, Chris Watson and Christian Zanési, as well as a chance to glimpse a work in progress by Richard Barrett and Daryl Buckley.

The works exist across a wide sonic palette, encompassing vocalisations of everyday life; animal calls and soundscapes from the natural environment; sounds from the island of Madeira and the coast of West Africa; the human voice strained to breaking, the making and drinking of coffee; the lapping of water in Sydney Harbour.

For this exhibition the pieces will be continuously scheduled in the Gallery, while the Collection will eventually be heard on a new soundscape system planned for RMIT’s city campus.

Things that matter..

"Our lives matter. Imagine the world we would live in if we could put that simple truth into action." Lisa McDonad Director of Mission St Vincent's Mebourne

My dream...

Tchaikovsky Flashwaltz at Hadassah Hospital, Israel.

Tchaikovsky Flashwaltz at Hadassah Hospital

Download video as MP3 or MP4

Art & Health_Music_Israel

Referencing: Art + Health in ED

Art + Health in ED

Architecture + Health Course. North Carolina, USA.

Brown: David Brown, 2012, Designing Sound for Health and Wellbeing: Composing Electroacoustic Compositions for a Hospital Emergency Department. 

Nanda: Upali Nanda, 2011, Impact of Visual Art on Waiting Behavior in the Emergency Department. 

Dead Symphony

Listen to an excerpt from Dead Symphony (Live).

A fusion of social documentary, art, biological science and music, Dead Symphony is a performance like no other – a sound world and lighting installation, performed in the hidden, unknown depths of Arts Centre Melbourne.

Sound is understood to be one of the last senses present before death. While most descriptions of near-death experiences focus on the visual, award-winning Melbourne artist Saskia Moore takes a different perspective by asking: what does it sound like?

Working with people who encountered near death experiences, Saskia discovered that many hear astonishing music, incredibly beautiful miniature symphonies.

The resulting work is a contemporary symphony that is lyrical, abstract, and beautiful. Performed in the secret ravines of Arts Centre Melbourne, audiences will embark an astonishing exploration of mortality and understanding, of the collision between art and science.

Foxfinder

Luxury & memory

My morning brew and mood, was enhanced by these reflections.. 

Razorback and Ah Kow Spurs - Lerderderg State Park

A 16.5 km hike with several river crossings and ascents to 500 metres in under 6 hours.

Challenging and energising.

Underbelly Arts Festival

Underbelly Arts

August 3-4 2013, 

Cockatoo Island Sydney

10, 000 small deaths & Forms of Thought.

Einstein on the Beach

Einstein on the Beach is an opera in four acts, composed by Philip Glass and directed by theatrical producer Robert Wilson.

Einstein on the Beach, Phillip Glass. Part 1.

The Last Five Years

An emotionally powerful and intimate musical about two New Yorkers in their twenties who fall in and out of love over the course of five years. The show's unconventional structure consists of Cathy, the woman, telling her story backwards while Jamie, the man, tells his story chronologically; the two characters only meet once, at their wedding in the middle of the show.

The Block Skyhigh

Dreams for 2013

* Find a loving & beautiful man 'who gets me' and with him explore, develop & establish an enduring and loving partnership.
* Undertake a new clinical appointment which is stable, stimulating and which acknowledges my accomplishments.
* Treat myself to a Spring-seascape-holiday where I can relax & learn to sail.
* Continue to be healthy, expressive & honest.
* Sleep more.
* Prepare daily juices.
* Read more novels.
* Consider enroling in a silver jewellery making course.
* Commence Master of Art & Cultual Management at University of Melbourne.
* Make a plan to hike the French Italian Alps.
* Buy a Vespa.
* Cycle more.
* Investigate & mind map Arts & Health project further.
* Indulge in home interiors & create a sketch of my dream abode.
* Complete Provincial Quilt.

Final Day at StV's

Hope & happiness

By the time I had left the office tonight and was wandering to my car under the vague light of the moon, I realised that it was late and long past the departure of my students from their late shift. Yet despite all this I felt calm and appreciative that for now, I just have one committment to focus on. Which means that I can venture towards the weekend or evening as a time for relaxation, enjoyment and rest; and not be tormented by fatigue, guilt and the persistent desire to address objectives that were not completed during the week.

Its nice to just be. Even if it is only for a short time.

Someone recently said.. 'Happiness is ephermal and often difficult to remember'. I hope that I remember this quiet contentment when the next wave of work and study committments swells.

Soon I will be commencing a new clinical appointment and my Masters studies. An inspiring, exciting and defining time...

Happy 7th Birthday James

Mum & Jules with Mr James. The number one Hawks fan

Labyrinth

Not to be confused with a maze, there is one way in and one way out of a labyrinth. Its purpose is not to be overly challenging, but when walked reflectively we find our perspective constantly and gently changing.  Our vision and physical bodies are never facing the same direction for long.  

The journey, a spiral with numerous turns is designed to take us to the core, the source, the centre of our being. This ancient symbol of the journey ‘in’ and the journey ‘out’, is a perfect metaphor for the unexpected opportunity of winter. 

To withdraw from the world for a time.

To take time, slow time, with our thoughts.

To close in and be comforted.

To reconnect with things of genuine importance… to our soul. 

Shanti Yoga

Let yourself be silently drawn by the strange pull of what you really love.
It will not lead you astray.

Rumi

And the day came when the risk to remain tight in a bud

was more painful than the risk it took to blossom.

Anais Nin

http://www.shantiyoga.com.au/index.php

Early morning coffee

Bye Bye Rochene

Dear Rochene,

I will never forget your immense generosity, which was highlighted the day that you feed my parking meter all day, suspecting that I was in the library studying after night duty. When I had actually completed night duty and then walked past my car (which was parked in front of ED), and home. After the 30 minute walk I crashed into bed and only stirred by your phone call in the late afternoon when you had checked the library and feared that something had happened to me. You then came and picked me up and drove me to work to collect my car.

Rochene you are a beautiful woman, wife and mother.

Love you and good luck in Bundie.

Will miss you.

X

The Skin of Memory

PASSING BY THE TREE, THE SKIN OF MEMORY

An exhibition by Nathalie Hartog-Gautier
 Alliance Française de Melbourne.

This body of work from Natalies Hartog-Gautier is a literal and visual narrative on her experience and relationsip with her Aunt who suffers from Dementia. According to the artist, her Aunt remembers very little of the past and to visit her is like entering another world. The exhibition shows her attempt to remember their time together.

When I see her or think of her I attach images which, to use Proust’s expression,“will break the spell”. My aunt doesn’t speak French anymore and from the new language she has created, I developed a set of poems based on our surrealistic conversation. They translate my emotion into written sounds and rhythms.The paintings of geometrical shapes are a representation of the space we live in but with illusions and distortions translating the world my aunt lives in.

To remember the everyday objects that were part of her life: she uses rubbings on paper such as the armchair she used to sit on and other pieces of furniture. These images and the fragile paper vessels she has constructed from cotton fibers containing balls of bright blue wool, carry their own memory of the passing of time. Remnants of a past life and the memories of things past. A tactile and intimate pastiche of her life and Natalies recherche du temps perdu.

Mirka Hotel

Catthy & Jules at Mirka Hotel, St Kilda.

Ten year plan

Do you ever stop to ask yourself... "Where do I hope to be in ten years time?..."

About three months ago, I came across an article that stated we should answer this question by undertaking a written exercise and follow these three steps.

Firstly answer this question under three broad categories; health, career and personal. Secondly, when answering this question, imagine the best possible scenario (one without limitations; recommends being audacious and fearless). Thirdly, asked to imagine how our lives would look, feel and sound like (this includes where we are and who we are with).

Addressing this question seriously, proved to be challenging and confronting. Even though I like who I am and the life I have lived... I'm not too confident about my current initiatives and there are definite advantages to having a clear imagine of what I want my life to be like in ten years time. Primarily, because it puts a lot into perspective and most importantly, it helps me to align my priorities, balance my ambitions, and gives me a clearer vision about the path I need to take to achieve my dreams. 

Articulating answers to phase one to three, is only half of the exercise. Now I need to commit to the changes I want to see in my life.

Turner from the Tate Galelry, Adelaide

Three Seascapes, c 1887

One of a group of cursory marine sketches datable to the late 1820s, this  work was perhaps painted while Turner was visitng East Cowes, or in the studio from recollections of his stay there. It is unlikely to have been painted outdoors from nature. The canvas bears three sketches of sea and sky one of which was painted upside down so that one sky serves for two subjects when the canvas is turned. It is exhibited with two seascapes the right way up.

Very reminiscent of Mark Rothko.

Catherine O'Donoghue

Inspirational meeting of minds and artistic souls, over wine at Enoteca in Gertrude Street...

Balmoral

Boarding the plane home from Sydney after a fabulous day with my gorgeous friend Jessica. As always it was a decadent affair, commencing with french pastries at The Rocks, an inspiring and tempting perusal of tactile leather shawls and floral embrodiered Kashmir shawls, then a walk to Circular Quay to take the ferry to Balmoral where we leisurely wined, dined and talked over an eight course Degustation lunch sea side at the Bathers Pavilion. 

All boxes ticked. A perfect Saturday. 

Thanks Jessica

x.