This will hurt me...

Experiments in light #1, Dark Mofo, Hobart Experiments in light #2, Dark Mofo, Hobart Experiments in light #3, Dark Mofo, Hobart Experiments in light #4, Dark Mofo, Hobart

All of us. The living room, Geilston Bay. July 2013. As you know, the Internet is a wonderful place filled with the rich and varied treasures of the world holds (and RSS feeds.) The following are some things that I've had a look at in the last week. I call this: a Compendium of Click-throughs for Monday Morning... Re-examining ‘the Elephant Man’ : Nadja Durbach questions the extent to which Joseph Merrick, known as the Elephant Man, was exploited during his time in a Victorian ‘freakshow’, and asks if it wasn’t perhaps the medical establishment, often seen as his saviour, who really took advantage of Merrick and his condition. The industrial age is over, so why are we still punching in? Rethinking Work . Drowning mercy: why we fear the boats. Soviet-era erotic alphabet book from 1931. 5 Things Men Will Never Understand About Consoling a Woman . While the natural sciences have evolved – new fields, discoveries, methods – the social sciences have stagnated, answe...

Hobart in the Winter. Geilston Bay. July 2013. Sunday Top Five ? TODAY'S Sunday Top Five? How about The Five Things I've Heard About All This Week ? Minecraft. Zombies. Minecraft. Moshi Monsters. Minecraft.

Experiment on the way home #1. Sandy Bay Road, Sandy Bay. July 2013. Here is a poem that I wrote in two minutes about another poem that I wrote in one minute. I consider it... ...an experiment. I Wrote A Poem , Kris McCracken I wrote a poem once. It was a good poem. A poem like no other poem you have never heard. The poem - that I wrote - a draft a play a practice exercise game. It was a good poem. But I threw it away. Experiment on the way home #2. Sandy Bay Road, Sandy Bay. July 2013.

Walking home from work. St Davids Park, Hobart. June 2013. Wordless Wednesday. 10 Murray Street on acid. St Davids Park, Hobart. June 2013.

Ezra from the perspective of a crab: underwater .

Henry: Portrait of a boy taken underwater.

Mucking about in a pandani grove. Lake Dobson, Mount Field National Park. April 2013. And Then There Were None , Agatha Christie: I wonder why they changed the name? Red herrings galore, this one has a very elaborate set-up. B . Nowhere Man , Aleksandar Hemon: Displacement is never much fun. This novel explores that. I liked it. B .

Walking home in slow motion. East Derwent Highway, Geilston Bay. April 2013. The Indispensable Calvin and Hobbes , Bill Watterson: There is a lot of good stuff in this compendium, unfortunately it is a little marred by an uneven selection. B . The Map As Art: Contemporary Artists Explore Cartography , Katharine Harmon: A collection of work from contemporary artists who have utilised the idea of the map to express their vision. Using paint, food, salt, souvenir tea towels, nude bodies, and a whole lot more, you can see how artists have been able to explore a world free of geographical constraints. B- . Doctor Fischer of Geneva, or The bomb party , Graham Greene: A dark little exploration of greed, desperation and hatred. It's as bleak as all hell. B .

There's more than a touch of James Dean about Hank here...

I've seen the light. My bedroom, Geilston Bay. December 2012. Not Me - A German Childhood by Joachim Fest. Evocative family history that spans the rise an fall of the Nazis. It explores how one family remained intent on preserving life from the moral cancer of Nazism. B- . The Thin Man , Dashiell Hammett. A hard-boiled whodunnit featurinf a rough'n'tough detective, wealthy socialites, hard dinking coppers 'n crims, dodgy lawyers, lippy dames and greasy stoolies. Tremendous! B+ .

How many children can you see?

Rebel without a point?

Love is blindness. The bedroom, Geilston Bay. July 2012. A Man of the People is a 1966 novel by Chinua Achebe that foreshadowed a coup in post-colonial Nigeria. It tells the story of a young and educated narrator and his conflict with his former teacher who has pursued a career. One represents the changing younger generation; the other the traditional customs of Nigeria. An interesting novel graphically illustrates the challenges faced by African nations in the 1950s and 60s, it goes some way to explaining to outsiders why the continent has struggled in the aftermath of Western colonialism. Recommended. Andreï Makine is a Russian novelist who writes in French. Like the protagonist in his more recent novel - The Life of an Unknown Man - Makine is a man without a country (the Soviet Union of his formative years no longer in existence). This is a novel two very different, albeit related, parts. It is part meditation on finding autonomy even as when losing all control of one’s d...

Ezra impersonates Clint Eastwood. Mount Wellington, Hobart. April 2012. I figure that for today's Sunday Top Five we may as well try and be useful. Today I present to you My Top Five Quick And Easy Tips To [Hopefully} Take Better Photographs! Go to where the picture is! Be prepared to get your knees dirty for the sake of a shot. Get down on the ground, climb up a tree, squat low and reach up high. Like a lot of things in life, even the most ordinary thing can look far more interesting from a different angle or a different perspective. Don't fixate on the centre! If you're wondering why your photos might all look a bit 'the same', it could be that you are always focusing on the centre of the shot. Don't! Mix up your composition. Try and encourage the observer's eye to follow through the photo by using of strong lines or patterns. It's not always about the thing in the middle. Know where your light is! Light can make or break a picture....

See Ezra, this isn't your ordinary run-of-the-mill puddle. This here is what you call a Rannelagh puddle . A 'Rannelagh puddle'? Yeah, a Rannelagh puddle . What makes a puddle a 'Rannelagh puddle'? ... [Ahem] Plenty of Rannelagh.

Running is a means of terrestrial locomotion allowing humans and other animals to move rapidly on foot. Here Henry demonstrates the appropriate gait one might use when escaping a rogue shark or crocodile that strikes as you inspect boats in a marina. Well done Henry!

If I could fit on Jen's tummy, I'd like to lie down there too...

Yes, Henry is trapped in some kind of futuristic dystopian nightmare... ...Only to discover that actually, it was quite nice there.

Experiments at night (with pants) # 1. Constitution Dock, Hobart. June 2011. A: “This is a sorry sight.” B: “A foolish thought, to say a sorry sight.” A: “There's one did laugh in 's sleep, and one cried, ‘Murther!’ That they did wake each other. I stood and heard them; But they did say their prayers, and address'd them Again to sleep.” Now we break for a poem... Tonight , Elfriede Jelinek tonight my sparrows let go the snow into fields of carnations swollen with anger. tonight the three popes proclaim the revolution against teenage television. seals smash their heads bloody their heads on the elevators the paternoster elevators which delays the holding of their conference. tonight my sister the wind's bride gives blood for the cello of the jericho desert which prompts the trombones ...