Walk 1. Federation Trail East

Soon after we moved to Brooklyn the Bike trail of Federation Trail to the East was opened This included a bridge over the railway line and along the freeway edge.

The Federation Trail is a shared use path for cyclists and pedestrians, which mainly follows the heritage-listed Main Outfall Sewer (built in the 1890s) through the western suburbs of Melbourne 

  

Federation Trail and Pipeline 

The start of the Trail East 

Lovely paintings on the PAZStone building 

Taggers all along the way 

The shared bike path. Really flat 

beside the freeway. I bet on some mornings, the bikes just sail past all the cars!

Portables for Coates Hire 

Old Bradmill Factory 

The old Bradmill Factory 24ha site is slated to become a mini-suburb with up to 1500 dwellings and retail spaces. (2011) Not a lot of action!!! and permit expired this year.
I gather there is a huge amount of art and graffiti inside but not going to explore!

Grafitti on the Old Mill But How did they get there ?

Closer inspection reveals a ladder

The bridge over the railway line. A gentle Incline 

Looks like a country railway line! Right next to the West gate Freeway
Rail line to Newport 

The back of McIvor Reserve and Footscray Hockey Club
A hive of industry at the weekends 

Containers ring the property of Secon Freight Logistics all attracted taggers 

Glorious trees line the walk 

Running from the old pumping station in Spotswood to the banks of Werribee River, Greening the Pipeline is a proposal launched in June 2016  by a western suburbs council, Melbourne Water and City West Water, the state government and VicRoads.

Community Garden

I was down at Aireys for a few days over Australia day weekend and as I walked up to get a coffee after lunch I followed a sign that said Art in the Garden
Well the garden was the community garden 5 minute walk from the shops.
The art show was packing up but had a lovely chat to the Garden coordinator
It is a large block with huge raised wicking beds
The soil in Aireys is terrible, water-resistant dust really, and Blackwood trees take most nutrients SO raised beds are the go.
Heres plans for you Celia!

Lovely gate

covered fruit trees

lots of raised beds 

Corn is looking good 

pumpkins line the path!

Craft Activity one.The Tree

One of my goals for the year is to post monthly about any craft I have been doing
I have been fascinated by the rise in Yarn bombing. a novel I read a few years ago set in Bryon Bay and a group of 'after dark yarn bombers" because it was illegal. But today it seems to be popping up everywhere or even requested e.g. the Trees in City Square at Christmas

The garden when we moved in 

I haven't been impelled to join a project but thought I would do some at home.
We want to cover the Water Tank but that would be best tried by Celia with painting I think!!

The garden has greened up!

So I decided to do a Tree Yarn Bomb using one of the pergola posts.
I started to just knit squares, and the measurements once I'd done a few, was just casting on till the needle was 2/3 full and the knitted length of the needles was the right width.
Sue Murdoch had recently learned to crochet so I asked her to do some pieces which were great.
She also did some leaves of various scale and design.

Sue's orange crochet piece

Once I had them all finished I arranged them in a colour scale then started sewing
The stretch of the pieces made them grip well. Found it a little tiring holding them up as I stitched and clambering the ladder with care as I sewed!

I added this piece of wool as a caterpillar !

Then came the issue of adding branches

I used actual branches and covered them in a wool blend fabric 

Then trying out arrangements of the leaves and flowers etc 

Checking out how they hang.

The final result 

Branches in situ

Leaves need to be set so they hung OK

The leaves 

Anyone for shoes?

A few fun items!
Characteristically avant-garde, Iris Van Herpen’s otherworldly, sculptural garments, and the manner of their production, are redefining the language of fashion. An early proponent of 3D-printing techniques, Van Herpen has consistently sought to stretch the edges of her medium both conceptually and materially.

This and several more were on exhibition

She uses 3D printing to create her fashion as well as the shoes.

 Some are created without a heel so that the structure of the shoe keeps your foot semi vertical 

Not for Me!!

 These prickly looking shoes are by Dutch designer Jolan van der Wiel were formed using magnets and iron filings!

bit hard to see but the top and bottom are connected by a vertical piece of ? acrylic 

More Art

I had a lunch date cancelled but I decided to go into the NGV anyway and check out one of the Triennial exhibits that needed more time 
I was at the gallery with 1/3 of Melbourne!! I don't know if its just the holidays or the exhibition, So varied and free!
The one I was interested in was by Formafantasma an Amsterdam, a research based design studio of Andrea Trimarchi and Simone Farresin  in Amsterdam 
Created for the NGV Triennial, Ore streams, 2016–17, is a collection of critical design objects that look at materials and their origins; and in particular challenge the validity of industrial design and manufacturing systems and standards for electronic devices – products that ultimately become electronic waste – opening up future opportunities for above-ground mining.
This wa particularly relevant as my printer wa acting up and I wa thinking Ill just get another But this was a wake up to where all the best go.

this is a still from video of the breakdown of parts of a washing machine

And one of the problems about waste is that it is not always clear what the composition of plastics are, and that a lot of the plastic is impossible to separate from the metal, due to the glue used.

Really interesting interviews and videos of waste recycling
They're breaking down commercial printers 

(I fixed my printer!)

The set of objects within the NGV Triennial, formally based on commercial office furniture, question modernist design objectives, such as standardisation, universal style, efficiency and modularity. 
By revealing the invisibility of material origins within contemporary products, Formafantasma reveal how designers, who define what materials will become, can fail to consider or to communicate the sources or potential afterlife of the products they create.

This filing cabinet drawer is aluminium with lasered shots of the moon  

The side of the glass cabinet
The Side of the drawers are from the back of  hard drives.

More National gallery

 Really hot day (currently 42)has kept me indoors and looking for activity!
 These are in the Gallery on level 1.

Glorious feathered work

The Palace  of the Republic
Louise Paramor is well known for her large-scale public art commissions, which often combine formal concerns with a pop-inspired sensibility. With a specially commissioned installation involving a multitude of new paper sculptures that reference Paramor’s earlier artistic practice in conjunction with a survey of her recent colourful plastic assemblages.

Beach bucket etc

2 baby baths and dust pan with long handle

sort of like old fashioned christmas decorations 

There was also a great video installation taking a whole wall of the room
Paris-based, Australian contemporary artist Mel O’Callaghan. In this stunning two-channel video work titled Ensemble, man protests against the violence of man, and triumphs. 
Ensemble 2013 was shown at the Centre Pompidou, in both Paris and Malaga, and the Institut d’Art Contemporain Villeurbanne/ Rhône-Alpes in Lyon, France in 2016.