Melbourne Artefatcs from a Design Perspective

ASSESSMENT TASK THREE JULIA MADDISON MJ VANESSA

ARTIFACT ONE CITY OF MELBOURNE LOGO

*Reference : http://25.media.tumblr.com/WMNVe9474q76febkMJ85AatUo1_400.jpg

ARTIFACT TWO FEDERATION SQUARE

ARTIFACT THREE STATE LIBRARY

ARTIFACT FOUR MOOMBA FESTIVAL

*Reference : http://www.flickr.com/photos/rhysdaviesphotography/3259505922/sizes/o/

MELBOURNE ARTIFACT COLLABORATION Melbourne is a diverse city, difined by it’s people, it’s geography and it’s icons. This is an exploration in how the artifact affects our city. The first artifact explored is the new city of Melbourne logo created mid last year. It is designed to be an identity for Melbourne, branding it as a city. It cost $240,000 to create, involving a lengthy research and design process. This artifact has no specific location par say, but can be seen all over our city, on signs, banners and even documents. It is a significant icon to Melbourne because it is the new symbol of Melbourne. This image and text is supposed to capture Melbourne’s society, it’s culture, and personality, not a simple task. It is open to artistic interpretation, but it they didn’t necessarily achieve this goal precisely, one image cannot possibly capture all the aspects of Melbourne perfectly though. This icon doesn’t just connect us to Melbourne, it is Melbourne, represented pictorially. It is important for our city not only for this reason, but also because it because this pictorial representation presents Melbourne as a brand worldwide.

Gregory Ashworth and Mihalis Kavaravis state that, ‘most city marketing efforts start and finish with the visual elements of logos and slogans.’ “Branding needs to be thought of as a complete and continuous process interlinked with all other marketing efforts.2 Melbourne is a complex city with its own personality. As much as this logo can be scrutinized and criticized for not capturing Melbourne correctly, it is simply down to aesthetics. This image isn’t truly Melbourne, to truly experience a city you must visit it, be immersed in it’s people, it’s culture and then you get the true idea of it. A cities brand should not define it should simply serve the purpose of enticing people to experience it, so they can define it for themselves. ‘City brands have different characteristics and are affected by different factors that influence their evaluation.’ (Ashworth and Kavaris, 2007) It is therefor too shortsighted to simply base a representation of Melbourne simply on a logo, and to expect it to represent all the aspects of a city. A logo can summarize a city, but that is all, we must create the links to it’s personality ourselves and define the personality behind the logo, with other streams of marketing and with the creation of our personality for the city as a whole society.

This article I find has the most relevance to the topic at hand. The credibility of the source isn’t as austere as the previous two sources, but it comments directly on the artifact. This is an opinion piece from a blog called ‘igloo.’ It strongly supports the idea that the essence of Melbourne cannot be entirely captured in a logo, with comments such as, ‘I think the logo does well to represent Melbourne’s progressive architecture, but not sure if any of Melbourne’s culture is in there? But then again, how much can you ask a logo to do?’ This statement rings true, aesthetically it doesn’t necessarily represent Melbourne, but is that the sole purpose of a logo? A logo should be the face for the brand, not the whole brand itself. Time is needed to create a brand as Sean is quoted in Blackman’s piece, ‘I can see that over time it will grow on me and I’ll probably grow to like it when I see it in context around the city.’ Melbourne is a colourful and complex city, not just simply represented by an M with pretty gradients. It’s a city that should be celebrated and is, by many Melbournian’s do annually with the Moomba festival.

The Melbourne Moomba Festival began in 1954 and is celebrated on the Labour Day long weekend. It takes place along the iconic Yarra River banks and is essentially a festival for the people. This colourful festival is designed to connect the multicultural citizens of Melbourne through a celebration which showcases a range of cultural performances and offers numerous activities to people of all ages and backgrounds. The Parade continues to be the festivals largest

MELBOURNE ARTIFACT COLLABORATION attraction and is often a highlight event every year in Melbourne.

With Moomba being in it’s 54th year (2009), Journalist Adrew Murfett’s talks about how the festival will be revamped into one that will attract “new generations” as he describes the current event as being daggy. He explains how the festival will be “sharpening it’s image” in order to “seem more relevant” with our modern society. He also discusses how organizers are hoping to give the festival a “fresh look” by introducing a “vivid artistic concept”. Murfett’s article gives us a heads up as to what to expect for future festivals as he enthusiastically supports the need for a modern change. It allows the readers to understand how and why Melbourne’s largest festival is developing. That said, it poses the question of whether the new and improved festival will still hold and deliver the same essence that it once did when it first began.

Through the article ‘The Festival is a Theatrical Event’, this notion of letting go of our past and how the purpose of festivals has changed over the years is discussed. Initially, festivals were described as being “a major component of Australia’s cultural development” as their original purpose was to celebrate an achievement or goal within the community. Whereas now, festivals are all about the “high arts and culture.” Either way, “these festivals have made an increasing contribution to what one might refer to as a sense of community in the city.” The article helps us to understand how festivals have developed over the years, what a festival means and what they are expressing. Even though this article helps us to learn how festivals have progressed, each festival’s initial reason/celebration is different.

Sylvia Kleinert investigates the original purpose of the Melbourne Moomba Festival, in particular, it’s connection to the Aborigines through her article ‘An Aboriginal Moomba: Remaking History’. She speaks of how many believe that the creator of the Moomba Festival, Bill Onus, made up the Aboriginal word Moomba as she expresses that “Moomba was indeed a hoax perpetrated against whites”. It is discussed how the word Moomba may not actually represent “let’s get together and have fun” as most may believe, but is simply a phrase created by white institutions who “sought to maintain authoritative control over definitions of Aboriginality.” Also investigated is how both the audiences and the performers in the Moomba festival are “largely unaware of [the festivals] indigenous origins.” This article supplies us with the information needed to straighten out the miscommunications and misconceptions about the festivals origins that have been covered up by deceit and lost through time. Moomba is a celebration that brings people together, much like the State library brings together the minds and opinions of many Melbournian’s.

Sitting proudly in the heart of Melbourne’s Central Business District (CBD), the State Library of Victoria maintains a grandeur presence. Sprawling green lawn leads up to the grand example of 19th-century civic architecture, the mighty pillars and steps demanding a sense of knowledge and authority. The library was host to many statues. There was a pair of bronze lions that graced the libraries surroundings from the 1860s until 1937 and statues of Sir Redmond Barry, designed by James Gilbert and built by Percival Ball, installed in 1889.

Inside the library, you may be able to find the small fossils within the marble stairway. This serves as a reminder that this building originally served as library, art gallery and museum.

The library buildings also contain the LaTrobe Library - the important historical Australian collection of books and manuscripts. The library has it’s own rich history though, in 1861 the public library in Victoria was established by first governor Mr. Latrobe, classified a national institution. He spent 13,000 pounds for the erection of the building and purchase of books

MELBOURNE ARTIFACT COLLABORATION 20th January 1853. Mr. Justice Berry one of the excellence trustees of public library became head of the institution. After the ceremony of the laying of the foundation of stone, books had been purchased with the money sent from London. 1856 the library was opened and consisted of the central position Swanston- street frontage.

As the primary reference and research library in Victoria, the State Library is one of the oldest cultural institutions in city of Melbourne. With a focus on life-long learning, the State Library offers a wide range of educational lectures, seminars and exhibitions to keep the community engaged. This is arguably the communication hub of Melbourne which brings a lot of exchange of culture, ideals and knowledge. A vast array of media, in context to advertising could be used to develop socializing. Anybody can borrow various books on a large selection of subjects, allowing people to search for and locate publications, journals, websites and more.

The design is worth the visit alone, the stunning La Trobe Reading Room will make you smarter by osmosis. The octagonal room houses balconies of journals, books and reference materials climbing the white walls to the glass ceiling. It even features a cafe, ‘Mr Tulk’ on the La Trobe side of the building. This place makes books seem cool, and the cafe fare is so delectable for locals and international people come just for the coffee. Simple and modern, the refurbished design bridges and the gap between old and new, the massive arched windows permitting day long sunshine to poor into the dark interior.

The borrowing of books is not the state libraries only function. It serves the community and the people of Melbourne as a multicultural and entertaining centre for knowledge and education. It has beautiful design and is one of the architectural treasures of Melbourne.

Another Melbourne hub famous for it’s design is Federation square. Although plagued by controversy throughout its development, Federation Square is an undeniable success. In the 12 months since opening, the Square has received overwhelming interest from local and international tourists and designers.

The success of Federation Square is reflected in the number and diversity of visitors it has attracted in its short life. Federation Square is Victoria’s second most popular tourist attraction (behind Melbourne’s Crown Casino), and is expected to attract between six and seven million visitors in 2003 – almost double original estimates. The square attracts visitors from many demographics, male, female young and old.

At the conclusion of the design competition, there was great haste to proceed with the Project – Federation Square. The State Government in collaboration with the Commonwealth Government secured an additional $50 million (through the Federation Fund).

The Premier of Victoria during that time, the Hon. Steve Bracks MP, officially opened Federation Square on the Saturday 26 October 2002. The square was the civic and spatial component for Federation Square, establishing connections with the diverse context of the city and the surrounding urban and riverside landscape. The design allows for a vast series of uses, from the largest scale public gathering of up the 15,000 people to intimate areas for relaxation and main streets of Melbourne. To distinguish it from the city’s existing working roads, the square was surfaced in hand-laid (approx. 500,000) cobblestones of variegated coloured Kimberley sandstone. The square joins tightly to the surrounding streetscape at Swanston Street, the rises up one level towards the direction east which providing entrances at an upper

MELBOURNE ARTIFACT COLLABORATION level to several of the buildings of Federation Square.

The sandstone paving has been laid in a patterned design as one of the collaborative components of the public artwork programme. Paul Carter, writer and artist, linked this overall designed to a newly artwork called ‘nearamnew,’ set within the Square’s surface. This work of sandblasted paving records and voices the site’s history. The artwork reflects different and often conflicting subjects and stories throughout the site’s history.

The Labyrinth, so called because of its maze of zigzag surface corrugated concrete walls, is a unique passive cooling system. It is used to provide environmental climate control (cooling and heating) for the glazed Atrium and BMW Edge. Utilizing the specific climatic qualities of Melbourne, cool air is pumped through Labyrinth’s cells at night, cooling the concrete walls.

Federation Square provides individual centres that attract visitors in their own right, within an overall design that forms an effective and attractive public space for local, domestic and international visitors.

Importantly, the foundations to Federation Square’s current success will also form the foundation for its future development as a living, functional icon. The current design themes, processes and media will support the development and inclusion of new attractions and events long into the future.

Written by Julia Laskowski, Vanessa Masci, MJ and Maddison

MELBOURNE ARTIFACT COLLABORATION References: Ashowrth, G., Kavaravis, M (2007) ‘Beyond the logo: Brand Management for cities’ p.3-7 Blackman, M. (2009) ‘The new city of Melbourne logo’ viewed the 17th April 2010, < http:// blog.igloo.com.au/?p=429> Doring.J. (2009). Mediengeographie: Theories – Analyse – Discussion. United States: Transcript Verlag. p577-578.

Edmund La Touche Armstrong, BiblioBazaar, LLC, 2008, The Book of the Public Library, Museums, and National Gallery of Victoria.

Federation square management (2009). Federation Square - A case study in Architectural Design. Australia: Australian Broadcasting Corporation. p1-p4.

Gerard B. McCabe,James Robert Kennedy 2003, Planning the modern public library building.

Kleinert, Sylvia, 1999, ‘An Aboriginal Moomba: Remaking History’, Journal of Media and Cultural Studies, Vol. 13, No. 3, pp. 345 - 357 Martin, JM, Seffrin, GS, Wissler, RW, 2004, ‘The Festival is a Theatrical Event’, Theatrical Events: Borders, Dynamics, Frames, pp. 91 - 110 Murfett, Andrew, 2009, ‘Moomba Receives Youthful Makeover’, The Age, March 3 Nat Williams,Margaret Dent,National Library of Australia 2005, National treasures from Australia’s great libraries.