The Adelaide Review January 2013

THE ADELAIDE

review

THE ADELAIDE REVIEW

ISSUE 395 JANUARY 2013

www.ADELAIDEreview.com.au

Laurie anderson The avant-garde New Yorker will return to the Adelaide Festival for the first time in 25 years with three diverse shows

Vibrant city or drunk city?

What steps can Adelaide take to facilitate a vibrant evening culture?

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adelaide fringe Fringe Director Greg Clarke writes that the original spirit of the Fringe still shines

10

docweek The inaugural DocWeek begins in 2013 with acclaimed filmmakers D.A. Pennebaker and Chris Hegedus as guests

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the adelaide REVIEW january 2013

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issue 395

Editor David Knight davidknight@adelaidereview.com.au Associate Editor Nina Bertok ninabertok@adelaidereview.com.au Art Director Sabas Renteria sabas@adelaidereview.com.au Graphic Design Michelle Kox michellekox@adelaidereview.com.au

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National Sales and Marketing Manager Tamrah Petruzzelli tamrah@adelaidereview.com.au Advertising Executives Tiffany Venning Franca Martino Michelle Pavelic advertising@adelaidereview.com.au Photographer Jonathan van der Knaap Contributors Annabelle Baker David Bradley John Bridgland Greg Clarke Derek Crozier Alexander Downer Robert Dunstan Stephen Forbes Charles Gent

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The Australian sensation will perform with the ASO for a unique concert, as Blasko is one of this country’s most popular and acclaimed singer songwriters.

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THE ADELAIDE

REVIEW ISSUE 395 JANUARY 2013

THE ADELAIDE REVIEW

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LAURIE ANDERSON The avant-garde New Yorker will return to the Adelaide Festival for the first time in 25 years with three diverse shows

mash it up Disclaimer Opinions published in this paper are not necessarily those of the editor nor the publisher. All material subject to copyright.

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01 COVER Laurie Anderson, story page 24

Adelaide’s Mash dominated the recent Australian Graphic Design Association awards with 23 gongs. The Adelaide Review discovers the secret to their success.

VIBRANT CITY OR DRUNK CITY? What steps can Adelaide take to facilitate a vibrant evening culture?

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ADELAIDE FRINGE Fringe Director Greg Clarke writes that the original spirit of the Fringe still shines

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DOCWEEK The inaugural DocWeek begins in 2013 with acclaimed filmmakers D.A. Pennebaker and Chris Hegedus as guests

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feature

OFF TOPIC Khai Liew

Off Topic and on the record, as we let South Australian identities talk about whatever they want... as long as it’s not their day job. This month designer Khai Liew talks about his colourful childhood in Kuala Lumpur.

David Knight

“

I’ve come to realise that I always had an independent spirit about me,” Liew begins.

“My father visited Tokyo in the mid 60s and was so inspired he decided to build himself a Japanesestyle house in the middle of the tropics. While he was doing so I lived with my family in flat above our traditional late 19th century Chinese shop-house, with a central courtyard on the ground floor and a rooftop garden overlooking High Street. It was in the middle of town and in close proximity to ‘Little India’.

“The walk to school was long with a designated route – down the street and way up a hill.

Unbeknown to my parents I would save myself a lot of time and sweat by taking a shorter path, weaving my way through an opium den hidden behind a ‘shop’ down the street. The rooms in the den were dark and hazy, laden with languor and the sweet smell of opium smoke. It was the local hangout for the mainly Chinese smokers who lay on their sides on low wooden platforms and, becalmed with the drug, would generally view my intrusion with bemusement. Other mornings I would make my way through a low priced Indian restaurant which served Southern Indian curries on banana leaves to the Tamil workers. The food was delicious but the real action happened in the illicit drinking area behind the restaurant, reserved for the consumption of toddy, a fermented coconut alcoholic drink.”

Growing up in Kuala Lumpur was exciting for Liew due to the smells, the multitude of languages spoken, the mix of cultures and the lingering sense of lawlessness.

“The air was pungent with the smell of curries and other cooking. From the rooftop garden we would observe elaborate Chinese funeral processions or Hindu parades with their wildly painted and costumed revelers dancing past with spears through their tongues and cheeks or weighted hooks through their earlobes, eyes often bloodshot from one intoxication or another.

I would venture into the street and watch as they worked themselves into a trance. It was electrifying and this was everyday life in the middle of town.

“It was a nice mix. We lived harmoniously and celebrated each race’s religious beliefs. The divide was less pronounced than today.”

The Liews then moved into the Japanese-

Khai Liew

inspired house designed by Khai’s father, which overlooked Kuala Lumpur.

“It was a Japanese-cum-LA modernist house situated on a hill with a large balcony overlooking the city and the Malay village below. It had Shoji screens, sliding doors and an indoor garden with a fishpond. By Kuala Lumpur standards, it was a substantial land holding and we called it our farm. Our extended family built their properties there as well. Life was good.”

But this wild and lively upbringing would end in traumatic fashion.

“On a fateful Tuesday evening in May 1969 smoke billowed from every corner of the city, soon filling the air. It was a scary sight, taken in from our vantage. It signaled the start of the May 13 race riots sparked by Malay resentment of Chinese and Indian mercantile dominance of the economy. This event was to have dramatic and significant consequences for our family.

“Machine gun fire soon punctuated the air and helicopters hovered overhead. Cries for mercy rose

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above the yelling and screaming. Hundreds, perhaps many more were killed that night. Our extended family escaped the carnage by hiding in a rubber plantation adjacent to our property. I remember the bravery of my older sister running with my youngest sister on her back. Throughout the night we heard continuous screams and gunfire and cries for mercy in many languages. Death and destruction was all around. We came out of hiding after negotiations brokered by one of our employees, a ‘Haji’, with the village elders and we were escorted to a refugee camp at the main football stadium.

“It was traumatic. Military personnel rounded us up and we watched as they looted our houses.

Soon after they were burnt to the ground. There were thousands just like us seeking refuge in the stadium. We slept there for three weeks on the bleachers. These days I can sleep anywhere.”

Liew spent another year in Kuala Lumpur to finish his schooling while his parents moved to Hong Kong.

“Life changed and the family soon dispersed.

My brother Cheong (Liew, the Chef) was in Ballarat while all of my sisters were in England.

After finishing school, I bought a passage from Singapore to Hong Kong. This voyage was marked by a typhoon three days out of harbour.

“After those two tough years, the vision in a pamphlet of a boarding school by the sea with lawn tennis courts and beautiful palms seemed like heaven and that was how I spent my first year in Adelaide. In peace and amongst new friends.”

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the adelaide REVIEW january 2013

FEATURES | society | opinion | business | science | letters

Vibrant city or drunk city?

With Adelaide’s festival season looming, it seems timely to contemplate the ‘vibrant city’ agenda currently being foisted on us by our political leaders and policy makers.

Stephanie Johnston

W

hat makes a city vibrant and what is likely to give Adelaide that indefinable edge, or pulse we seem to hanker after? Will it be increased cultural activity, creative enterprise and relaxed licensing laws? Or is it more likely to be great urban spaces, quality design, good public transport and a strong sense of community?

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We know that successful cities seek to create their own unique identity and to build and develop the experiences on offer. “Today’s cities make a virtue of their atmosphere, their heritage and their nightlife,” according to PricewaterhouseCoopers.

“But more than this, they develop an intangible quality of creativity and innovation.”

So goes the theory. But what steps can Adelaide take, and what interventions can we make to create the kind of cultural milieu the global experts are telling us is necessary for our future prosperity?

One quick-fix solution came out of a whirlwind visit by New York-based placemaking expert Ethan Kent, who proposed a ‘Power of 10 Plan’ that would give the city square mile 10 precincts, each with 10 locations, or 10 activities or reasons to visit.

In contrast, in the same week, Henriette Vamberg from Copenhagen’s Gehl architects came to town. She delivered a comprehensive 160-page report based on a 10-year period of study, full of deeply considered and beautifully illustrated recommendations on how to breathe life into our streets and spaces. Simultaneously Wakefield Press released City Streets, Lance Campbell and Mick Bradley’s extraordinary chronicling of two very distinct eras in Adelaide’s urban evolution.

Anticipating the cynics who like to point out how good Adelaide is at creating plans that collect dust, Lord Mayor Stephen Yarwood challenged those present at the Gehl study launch to use the document as a tool to get a broad range

Help us save the Rundle Mall Fountain

Bentham Street

of people involved and engaged in city planning.

“This document is already being implemented in the city of Adelaide,” he said, citing recent threefold increases in pedestrian traffic in Chinatown, Gouger Street, Rundle Street and North Terrace.

“It will be the bible by which we can engage people in an exciting innovative paradigm shift that is all about involving people with cities.”

Vamberg agreed that completing the study and its recommendations represents only a half of the task at hand. “The other half is more about engaging with people and with government,” she told The Adelaide Review. The real change takes place in people’s minds. “So we need to ask what are some of the little things we can do now, what are the long-term strategies that can gradually be implemented, and what are the

special catalyst projects that can create change.”

Urbanist Jane Jacobs referred to such interventions as ‘urban chess-pieces’. These place a new element in the built fabric in a particular time and space in order to make other things happen around it.

John Montgomery, a fan of Jacobs who has spent some time in Adelaide gained global planning notoriety for his role in the successful revitalisation of an area of Dublin known as Temple Bar. Like Melbourne’s laneways rejuvenation, Temple Bar is often cited internationally as an exemplary case study in the creation of a vibrant cultural precinct from a historic docks district headed for dereliction.

In his own analysis of the Temple Bar success story, Montgomery lists a number of concepts

Adelaide City Council is removing the iconic Rundle Mall fountain located in front of Adelaide Arcade as part of the Rundle Mall Redevelopment in 2013.

This 125 year old fountain became part of Rundle Mall when Rundle Mall opened in 1976. The then Premier Don Dunstan officially opened Rundle Mall at this beautiful fountain as it flowed with champagne. This is a true piece of Adelaide history that should live on in the heart of our city, Rundle Mall. The fountain could be saved by simply moving it closer to Adelaide Arcade to accommodate the Redevelopment.

Please visit Adelaide Arcade or visit www.adelaidearcade.com.au to sign the petition to keep the beautiful and historic fountain in front of Adelaide Arcade in Rundle Mall.

the adelaide REVIEW january 2013

9

FEATURE

Bentham Street, concept courtesy of Gehl Architects

that might help Adelaide find our way to vibrancy nirvana. These include the cultivation of the creative industries, the development of a public realm that enhances, rather than hinders, connectivity and commercial activity, and the insertion of Jacobsstyle chess pieces into that process.

Plans to demolish the Temple Bar district’s empty old buildings were replaced with short term low rent offers to small restaurants, art galleries and clothes shops. These attracted ‘arty’ types, then people working in popular music, followed by people working in design ­– and suddenly the area found itself dubbed Dublin’s ‘Left Bank’. Establishment of the Temple Bar Development Council followed, along with a system of tax incentives for private investors that stimulated refurbishment of the historic

buildings. An urban regeneration proposal based on these concepts hooked £4million to the cause, and a state-owned development company was formed. A development framework was then established involving the following ideas: • new and refurbished venues • a cultural animation program of events and activities • ‘what’s on’ information and marketing to the public • street life and café culture • conservation of the old and modernity in new building • preservation and enhancement of historical streetscapes and patterns of streets in terms of frontages, storey heights and doorways • vertical zoning for diversity allowing (for

example) cafés, restaurants and shops on the ground floor, artist studios on the first floor and apartments above.

The other important element championed

by Montgomery is the notion of the evening economy, or 24-hour city. A concept developed in the UK in the late 1980s, this was essentially about opening up the possibilities for people to meet, trade, buy and sell ­– a meal, a drink, a newspaper, a hotel room or a musical performance – across extended hours. According to Montgomery the theory applied not just to traditional places like pubs, bars, restaurants and nightclubs, but also to shops, gyms, cinemas, music venues, art galleries, theatres and pool halls, as well as to a range of cultural and recreational activities such as evening classes, clubs and societies.

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“But even as the first 24-hour city conference was held in Manchester in 1993, it was becoming evident that 18 hours is about enough,” says Montgomery. “In Dublin especially, where the policy was to bring people back to live in the city centre, it was clear that there would be a conflict between new residents and noise and rowdy behaviour associated with certain late-night activities.”

Like Melbourne and a number of other Australian cities, Dublin however eventually pursued deregulation policies that favoured a plethora of new drinking places and extensions of their opening hours. The Temple Bar district eventually became better known for its stag parties and hens nights out than its ‘Left Bank’ culture, developing such a fearsome reputation that by 2005 the BBC avoided filming there during the making of a holiday program about Dublin and its attractions.

During the decade following deregulation in Victoria, the number of people hospitalised for alcohol-related injuries and diseases jumped 77 percent, as the number of licensed premises rose from 2000 to 24,000. Escalating alcohol-related disturbances, ranging from vandalism, offensive behaviour and disruption, to serious assaults, glassings and stabbings, led to a police and media backlash, which saw the NSW and Victorian governments take drastic action. Lockouts and bans on new licences were introduced and freezes and restrictions were placed on existing licences. In Sydney, small bars were heralded as the solution, and laws were overhauled to remove onerous and expensive licensing processes in order to foster a more sophisticated ‘European-style’ drinking culture ­– only to be overturned within a year.

Recognisng that all bars – big and small – can cause problems, Victoria has since come up with a rating system and licensing fee structure that rewards bars and clubs with early closing hours and strong compliance records, while penalising non-complying serial offenders.

As our own lawmakers finalise a new late night code of practice for Adelaide’s larger venues, and loosen up laws to support a proliferation of smaller venues, they can anticipate that the aim to encourage more city centre living is inevitably going to clash with the desire to develop a more vibrant evening economy.

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the adelaide REVIEW january 2013

opinion

When did the arts get so popular?

The original spirit of the Adelaide Fringe continues to this day writes the festival’s Director and Chief Executive, Greg Clarke.

Greg Clarke

F

or years a friend of mine tried to get her 22-year-old ‘tradie’ son to go see theatre and enjoy it, to embrace it like she has done her whole life. He’d rather surf, play footy, watch TV, go out drinking with his mates or do anything but go and pay a lot of money to see something he struggles to understand and doesn’t really enjoy. But over the last couple of years something strange has happened, come February and March he’s out nearly every night having the time of his life, seeing weird ‘arty stuff’ in tents in the Parklands or in pop-up performance spaces in old unused buildings.

When the Adelaide Fringe hits town he can’t get enough of seeing art. When did the Fringe suddenly

get so cool or has it always been that way?

The answer to that is very simple, it’s always been cool. It started in 1960 by a group of very with-it young artists as an alternative to the new Adelaide Festival of the Arts, which offered very few opportunities for local artists. They decided to make it an open access festival in that anyone could participate. How democratic yet socialist is that? ‘Bugger’ the mainstream we make art and we want it to be seen.

By 1964 there were 52 art exhibitions and performances that made up the Fringe. There was a name change in 1975 to Fringe Focus and by 1982 the program listed 86 performing arts groups in more than 50 venues with 56 visual arts exhibitions. The 2013 Adelaide Fringe will feature 930 events including 114 cabaret shows, 32 circus and physical theatre shows,

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107 theatre productions, 254 comedy events, 25 dance shows, seven film events, 197 music concerts and 105 art exhibitions.

The Fringe has certainly come a long way since those early days and it is now an event that has dramatic social, cultural and economic benefits to not only Adelaide and South Australia but also nationally. In 2012 the economic impact of the Adelaide Fringe was a huge $48.2 million, so to say the Fringe is important to the state is a huge understatement.

But the truly great thing is that the original open access spirit of that very first Fringe continues to this day. Nothing has changed; anyone can be in the Fringe. It encourages everyone to have a go. It lets artists be entrepreneurs, not only by creating their own work but by producing it as well. Very few rely on government grants, instead they risk their own money to put on a show that they have created for us to come and enjoy. Then there’s another great bunch of entrepreneurs

who create unique Fringe venues, wonderful, almost magical spaces, which then get filled with lots of these extraordinary artists.

But it is these thousands of artists from all over the world that come here to entertain us, excite us, move us and enable us to see things we have never seen or heard before that are at the very heart of the Fringe. It is through their imagination, passion, ideas and talent that the Fringe continues to go from strength to strength. They expose us to fascinating new experiences and stimulating ideas.

As the Director, I constantly get asked what I’ve chosen for the next Fringe. With over 900 events there is no way I could program that many shows. The Fringe team does a lot of encouraging and facilitating, but at the end of the day it’s the artists who decide to come here and show their work. Much of their work is only an hour long and the majority of shows are still around $20. It’s accessible, affordable and everyone is getting in on the action.

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the adelaide REVIEW january 2013

11

opinion I recently spoke at the Peace Foundation dinner to over 300 people and asked how many people in the room had participated in the Fringe. This was not just going to the Fringe to see a show but how many had exhibited, performed or worked at the Fringe. This could have gone horribly wrong but over half the audience put up their hand. At another event I asked the audience how many people had been to a Fringe show and the entire audience put up their hand.

As the Fringe has been going for over 50 years there are now three generations of South Australians who have been going to, or performing in, the Fringe and they just keep on coming. This is a festival that is engrained into Adelaide’s way of life and South Australia’s. At the 2012 Fringe over 300,000 tickets were sold. That’s a lot of tickets for any festival to sell, in fact that’s a lot of tickets for anyone to sell over12 months. Add on another million attendances at free Fringe events and that’s a ‘hell of a lot’ of South Australians getting a good dose of the arts.

The definition of a festival is an event, usually staged by a local community, which centres on the celebration of some unique aspect of that community. In the Fringe Festival’s case that aspect is creativity and the making of art by the people. And like any good festival it also involves feasting, drinking, celebrating, pleasure, sex, laughing together, indulging, partying, learning, a sense of belonging, sharing stories and maybe even finding a mate. No wonder my friend’s ‘tradie’ son can’t get enough of art over that special four weeks at the end of summer when our very own Fringe Festival, that we all helped create, takes over our city.

Greg Clarke is the Director and Chief Executive of the Adelaide Fringe adelaidefringe.com.au

THIRD AGE

Getting up close and personal with the past.

Shirley Stott Despoja

T

hird Agers know better than to make a big deal about New Year. It is just another January with things lurking in it. But this year I have to carry out a vow: to go through my papers. On the stroke of midnight, a fine sweat on my brow will break out, and with it that nasty little squeezy feeling in the chest, which people of my age do not relish at all. It’s time to get up close and personal with the past.

2013 is the year when I will closet myself with boxes of papers, cuttings, letters, unfinished novels, court judgments (all in my favour in case you think I am a mug), marginalia, memorable quotes... the detritus of a writer’s life. Yellowing newsprint is the most interesting; past written threats to my life and wellbeing are the scariest (one of the things that really got some men going ape in the 80s, was the proposal to admit women to the fire brigade). And there are the lovely ones. These belong to pre-internet days, when people who liked what you wrote picked up a pen, some nice notepaper and wrote, without benefit of hash tags. It was a deliberative act, not an impulsive sign-in to Facebook with something like: “Kool wot U wrote, hugs XXX.” Yes, enough of that. All this paper I must sort through tells a bigger story. It chronicles my contact with the social and political changes of 50 or so years. Julian Barnes has one of his characters, not the brightest of a bunch of pretentious schoolboys in The Sense of an Ending (Booker Prize winner 2011), claim that history is the memory of survivors.

People of my age are survivors of some of the most radical, concentrated changes ever. We survived the wars our fathers and mothers went to, the wars our fathers and mothers engaged in at home, political fights about education (free? private? religious?

secular? tertiary fees?), advocacy for women in the work force, for women everywhere, the outing of criminal assault in the home, the gradual, perilous uncovering of the prevalence of incest, and later on, the discovery that people could finally talk out loud about sexual abuse, especially of children. These are just a few of the changes. We went from pretty young things with hats and gloves to tough women in jeans; from people who largely did what they were told, to people who questioned everything.

But history is more than memories.

Documentation is necessary. Another of Barnes’ smartarse schoolboys says that history is ‘that certainty produced where the imperfections of memory meet the inadequacies of documentation’.

It’s clumsy and his teacher shoots holes in it, but the story of the protagonist’s life – a 60-ish overcautious, self-regarding man – takes off from there in a riveting novel about ageing, memory, missing documentation, regret – and the horrible truth that the lessons you learn about yourself in old age come too late to be useful.

The points made about needing documentation stand up.

I know that some of us wake in the night with the thought: I must tell my daughter/son/ grandchild that. Before we fall back to sleep we recognise that what seems so important to us will not likely catch the attention of the younger person. If siblings cannot agree on their family history, people separated by generations will likely regard our memories as at least part fiction. What we need is documentation to back up our stories.

As Barnes’ ageing narrator says, ‘as witnesses to your life diminish’ there is ‘less certainty as to what you are or have been’. Even if you have kept records, they may prove to be wrong or inadequate.

Perhaps I am talking myself out of getting my papers in order. But someone has to do it, I suppose, even if it proves to be just an inadequate record of my past, totally fallible as history and makes me have a little cry. ////////////////////// When I heard of Dame Elisabeth Murdoch’s death at the age of 103 in December, and read many tributes to her intelligence and

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understanding – observable in TV interviews late in her life – I recalled that about 18 months ago Peter Coleman, a columnist for the Australian segment of The Spectator, expressed regret that Dame Elisabeth had co-signed a letter to The Age supporting the carbon tax. He wrote: “She is a grand old lady and a great Australian. But there is no evidence that she has made or can make an independent assessment of the issue. At 102 it is not surprising that she has had some difficulty in following the debates or always staying awake during discussions.”

Breathtakingly patronising, but that is not the point I am making; which is that Peter Coleman was 83 when he wrote this.

He appears to believe in a hierarchy of the old. Are you young enough to have an opinion at 83, but not at 102 (as the great Dame was at the time this was published)? She must have wanted to box his ears.

12

the adelaide REVIEW january 2013

FEATURE

Life in the hot zone This is a love story but don’t be put off. This is a tale of humanity, infectious diseases and how two South Australians are saving the lives of Africa’s poorest people.

Grant Mills

W

hen Michael Findlay was in early high school his father handed him a book. It wasn’t your typical father-son gift; it was The Hot Zone by Richard Preston and it detailed the outbreak of haemorrhagic fever diseases, like Ebola, in Africa.

The experience inspired Michael to someday work as a doctor in Africa but it inspired horror writer Stephen King to write: ‘The first chapter of The Hot Zone is one of the most horrifying things I’ve read in my whole life – and then it gets worse… What a remarkable piece of work.”’

Following the course he had set for himself, Michael enrolled in Medicine at The University of Adelaide and took every opportunity to work in Africa throughout his studies.

It was then, at home in Adelaide, that he met Kim, the woman who would become his wife. “When I was 19, I spent three months in Kenya… Africa got into my heart, my head, my bones and from then on I knew I would live there someday,” Kim remembers.

Volunteering around Adelaide in Refugee Resettlement with African communities, Kim

was completing her Masters in International Development. She was introduced to Michael through a mutual friend and the pair spent much of their first meeting discussing their individual plans to move to Africa.

“The idea of doing something in Uganda formed during my ‘elective’ to Uganda at the end of my fifth year of medical school,” Michael recalls. “Initially [I] had the idea of building a hospital only, but as time went by it became apparent that there was no point offering treatment unless we were also trying to combat the reasons why people had such poor health.”

“While Michael knew he wanted to provide a health service, he was aware he wanted a more holistic approach…then I came along and also had skills in Community Development,” Kim said.

Together Michael and Kim founded Maranatha Health, a not-for-profit that would offer health services to some of Uganda’s poorest people as well as foster long-lasting behaviour change.

In February 2011, Michael and Kim quit their respective jobs and moved to the Kamwenge District of Western Uganda and began managing Maranatha Health on the ground. In a district of 300,000 people and

no practicing doctor, Maranatha Health’s outpatient clinic was quickly consulting up to 70 people a day.

In January 2012 Maranatha Health opened its 20-bed inpatient clinic and their multifaceted community programs began, taking in health education, micro credit initiatives, building community cooperation and empowering local Ugandans to claim their rights as citizens.

“We chose Kamwenge after consulting with the [Ugandan] Ministry of Health about under-serviced districts,” Michael points out.

“Kamwenge was, by far, statistically the worst off and our visits there correlated with the statistics.

Kamwenge has an under-five mortality rate of approximately 25 per cent.”

With Michael managing the health services and Kim guiding the community outreach, they have built up Maranatha Health to a staff of 35 people. This is despite few resources, endemic government corruption and the confronting reality of living in poorest Africa.

Kim relates the story of a close friend in Kamwenge who now looks after her three grandchildren because she has outlived every one of her six children.

“I was sitting with her the other day in her very simple home, as she told the emotional story of her last daughter dying of cerebral malaria and her struggle to find the funds to transport her to hospital,” Kim said.

“These are the stories that drive us, and drive our organisation’s goals – because it is a story that shouldn’t exist. No matter where you are in the world, you should not outlive all of your children – no mother deserves that much heartache.”

In October 2012 Michael was awarded the inaugural James McWha Award for Excellence, which recognises the achievements of one outstanding alumni of The University of Adelaide. This month Michael and Kim return to Adelaide for the first time in nearly two years to be the guest speakers at the Maranatha Gala Dinner being held on January 25 to raise vital funds for the charity.

“It is amazing what a small amount of funds can do in Uganda – for $50 we can offer life saving treatment to a child with deadly cerebral malaria. Our community team, whose work has long lasting impact, can train a group of community health workers to deliver vital health messages for just $100,” Michael said.

Despite an intense couple of years, Michael and Kim’s love affair with Uganda has not faded. They know that lasting community and system change is a long-term aspiration, yet they can’t see themselves doing anything else, anywhere else in the world.

“In the meantime,” Kim says, “we celebrate the simple successes – families in the village choosing to boil their water before drinking, or building their own pit latrines; a mother choosing to bring her child early to the clinic so it has a better chance of survival; or a community advocating for their rights to health and education services.”

Maranatha Gala Dinner Friday, January 25 For more information: contact@maranathahealth.org maranathahealth.org

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the adelaide REVIEW january 2013

13

opinion

Putting the lid back on Pandora’s Box Stephen Forbes

O

ne of Australia’s treasures is Rhododendron lochiae – Australia’s native Rhododendron.

The presence of Rhododendron in the mountains of Queensland was predicted by Ferdinand von Mueller and subsequently confirmed by plant hunters. There remains some contention around the definition of a second species from the same region. In partnership with the Australian Rhododendron Society and with support from the Stanley Smith Horticultural Trust, the Botanic Gardens of Adelaide have agreed that Mount Lofty Botanic Garden will host the ex situ conservation collection for this species. Mount Lofty is a long way from Queensland but is better suited for maintaining such a collection than Brisbane’s Mount Cooth-tha or Cairns’ Flecker Botanic Gardens. As an endangered species, the journey to obtaining approval to collect living material from the field from both the Queensland National Parks & Wildlife Service and the Aboriginal Traditional Owners will take some time.

One of the many spectacular plants that the Adelaide Botanic Gardens should be growing with the signature Giant Amazon Waterlily has been in the pipeline for acquisition for six or seven years. The plant, Brocchinia micrantha is a tank bromeliad – the bases of the leaves form water tanks with an ecology of their own that includes providing home to the Golden Poison Arrow frog. Failing to source the plant in Australia the Gardens began the challenge of running the gauntlet of approvals to bring the plant into Australia. The Gardens has had to satisfy a biosecurity risk assessment for approval to import, obtain permits to satisfy the Convention on Trade in Endangered Species (CITES), meet quarantine requirements for import to Australia (and export from, in this case, the US) and ensure the plants survived quarantine procedures.

Marvellously the Brocchinia is finally here and

Brocchinia micrantha, Kaitteur Falls, 2007

seems to be establishing itself in quarantine.

Even sending plant material out of Australia is challenging. In partnership with the Dahlia Society of South Australia the Gardens recently sent dahlia tubers to the Parc Floral in Paris at their request. The dahlias will be entered in an international dahlia exhibition in Paris in 2013 and shown in the Parc Floral – part of Paris’s botanic gardens network. This exercise required pre-export inspections during the growing season as well as export and import permits dependent on the issue of a phytosanitory certificate.

The development of plant collections in putative ancient ‘botanic gardens’ can be interpreted as being as critical to the development of modern civilisation as food surpluses, writing and the formation of cities. The relatively recent beginnings

of Australia’s botanic gardens are rooted in economic and social agendas. For example, the first director of Adelaide’s Botanic Gardens saw the Gardens as a conduit ‘(through) which flows the vegetable riches of other countries to be distributed in our own.’ and as, ‘… a place of rational amusement for the public, and of instruction to the young.’ George Francis’ successor, Richard Schomburgk can take credit for introductions such as DuToit’s wheat, the foundation for the success of South Australia’s economic development through the wheat-rush from the 1860s to the 1880s and even today’s wheat industry.

While there is considerable merit in the introduction of, in Francis’ words, ‘useful, harmless, interesting and ornamental plants’ and in understanding the opportunities and threats posed by introduced and native plants there are significant risks in such introductions. Plants established for utility, such as the prickly pear or the blackberry, may turn out to have a Jekyll and Hyde personality as Australians have found to their cost. Such plant introductions have directly impacted the conservation and primary production estate, or in the case of ornamental Berberis (barberry) species provide an alternate host for the devastating wheat rust (Puccinia graminis).

With a changing climate, efforts to control trade in endangered species, requirements for benefitsharing of biodiversity with countries of origin and the potential impact of breaches of biosecurity the legal importation of plant material into Australia is now more challenging than ever before.

The current devastation of Britain’s ash (Fraxinus excelsior) woodlands reinforces the potential of biosecurity breaches to change our landscapes.

The pathogen, ash dieback (Chalara fraxinea), reached Britain with imported nursery stock. The deadly disease has highlighted the debate about the countervailing demand for free trade that can dilute efforts to tighten biosecurity. The head of forest pathology at the British Forestry Commission has

observed that more than twice as many diseases have arrived in Britain in the first 10 years of this century than in the whole of past century despite advances in understanding biosecurity.

Prior to the tightening of biosecurity botanic gardens could freely exchange plant materials. The great diaspora of plant material that accompanied the Age of Empire through to the 20th century was unparalleled in history. Botanic gardens accumulated staggering living plant collections with holdings worldwide of over four million living plant collections representing more than 80,000 species – perhaps a third of the known flora worldwide.

The reasons for the tightening are all too apparent but the flow of plant material has now stemmed from a flood to a trickle. In many ways this isn’t a bad thing. Botanic gardens need to focus on better understanding the values of their existing living collections and the significance of gaps in those collections.

The effort of interrogating the provenance and purpose of living collections will ensure that significant living plant material is more effectively stewarded. The effort of obtaining new material might ensure that only material that presents high value for the living collections (in terms of conservation, education, research values, or of course, beauty or charisma) and has low risk in terms of breaching biosecurity, ownership or conservation protocols is chased down rather than an eclectic ad hoc approach to collections development. The analogy with Pandora’s Box has merit – but if the contents represent the Earth’s botanical diversity the threats to be assessed on a case by case basis – a difficult task.

Stephen Forbes is the Executive Director of the Botanic Gardens of Adelaide

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14

the adelaide REVIEW january 2013

science

A look ahead Paul Willis

L

ast year we were given a glimpse of the future, a taste of what’s to come over the next 50 years or so. Most people missed it and, as a society, we are poorly placed to make the most of a world that will be shaped by the forces of the Higgs Boson.

After nearly a half-century since it was first proposed, the elusive Higgs Boson was finally captured by the Large Hadron Collider. Particle physicists were euphoric and told the world we had entered a new era. This was an event at least as significant as the splitting of the atom or the discovery of electricity. But this message and its implications were lost amid a swamp of convoluted explanations as to what is a Higgs Boson and what it is not. It is a subatomic particle or field of force (essentially one and the same) that gives other subatomic particles mass. It is not The God Particle that somehow reveals a divine plan in the structure of nature. That inappropriate nickname arose when

“

Working out the potential and mechanics of the Higgs Boson will be the task of our children and harnessing that potential will be the careers of our grandchildren. Only the very brightest will be able to participate in that quest."

January 2013 FINAL.indd 1

the elusive Higgs Boson was described as being too god-damned difficult to find. What we had found was a missing piece in our understanding of how the universe is put together.

But is it as significant as the first split atom or the discovery of electricity? To understand that comment take yourself back to the time when the first atom was split or the first simple electric circuits were constructed. Did they understand then what those discoveries would lead to? At the conclusion of a lecture about electricity and magnetism at the Royal Institution in London the then Chancellor of the Exchequer, William Gladstone, asked Michael Faraday what possible use it could ever be. “Why, Sir”, the physicist replied, “there is the probability that you will soon be able to tax it”. (An alternate version has the retort: “What good is a new-born baby?”)

We simply don’t know what Higgs Bosons could do if we can harness them. I could speculate that, because they are concerned with transferring the property of mass to other matter, then perhaps we could alter the mass of materials without altering other properties. Imagine the applications for steel that is as light as a feather or being able to make a gas like carbon dioxide so heavy it literally falls out of the air. Alter mass and you alter the force of gravity. You could build the Star Ship Enterprise on Earth then change its mass to virtually nothing, float it into space then restore its original mass. Bizarre science fiction possibilities that may be only just beyond our reach. If only we knew how to manipulate the newly found Higgs Boson.

Working out the potential and mechanics of the Higgs Boson will be the task of our children and harnessing that potential will be the careers of our grandchildren. Only the very brightest will be able to participate in that quest, the best educated and the keenest minds. So are we giving our kids those tools that will let them work in this industry? I don’t think we are.

If we want our kids to play in this and other future

sandpits, the best legacy we can present them with is a solid, high-quality education in the sciences. Yet already the current standards of science and mathematics education in Australia are falling behind the global average. In the results of an international survey of education standards conducted in 2010 and released late last year, a quarter of Year 4 students failed the minimum reading standard and they were out-performed by students in 21 other countries in maths and science. Despite these poor results several states persisted with deep cuts to their education budgets. Worse still, some state governments directly intervened in the science curriculum to remove content they found unpalatable. (In Queensland, all references to Climate Change were to be struck from the classroom). This is not an appropriate strategy for developing the minds that will manage the world of the late 21st century.

If we want to be part of this adventure we had better learn to work more effectively as part of international science collaborations. While, as a nation, we do have a good reputation for presenting high quality researchers to participate with other nations in all areas of science, it takes big bucks and political will to buy seats at these tables. Last year’s announcement of Australia’s $2 billion toward the development of the Square Kilometre Array was a step in the right direction. We now need to sign up to other international science ventures, like the Large Hadron Collider or one of the international space exploration programs, if we want to have a controlling hand in the technologies that will rule our lives and economies tomorrow.

Talk is cheap and sells us short in the markets of the future. We can talk all we like about being the Clever Country, the various Smart States or being part of the Innovation Revolution, but if we don’t put in place the fundamental building blocks such as a high-quality education accessible to all of our smart kids, then we are setting ourselves up for future failure and exclusion from the technology that will one day rule our lives. Not such a Clever Country.

Dr Paul Willis is the Director of RiAus

WHAT'S ON IN SCIENCE Bringing science to people and people to science The Science Exchange, 55 Exchange Pl Adelaide Bookings: riaus.org.au | t: 7120 8600

RiAus Art: Land is Life exhibition Monday, January 7 to Friday, February 1, 2013 Monday to Friday 10am-5pm Free, no booking required

Featuring the photographs of Rodney Dekker and Matthew Willman. This exhibition documents the stories of people from the small Pacific Island nations of Kiribati and Tuvalu and the Western Cape of South Africa, who are all facing increasing difficulties due to the impacts of climate change.

Jointly presented with Oxfam Australia.

Take a Break for Science Wondering what to do during the coming holiday season? Why not visit riaus.org.au for all the science you may have missed during the year. Video features include Prof Brian Schmidt, 2011 Nobel Laureate, giving his Science Inspiration presentation about the expanding universe. You can also find out about the Science Behind the Headlines, with Marine Parks and ‘no-take’ zones being the latest topic. Or, if you are planning to enjoy some treats this festive season, why not watch our Free Range Science videos:.

Fringe @ The Science Exchange February 15 – March 9 The Science Exchange 55 Exchange Place, Adelaide

Bookings are now open for Fringe 2013 @ The Science Exchange, with amazing science comedy from Peer Revue; James Colley vs His Own Stupid Brain; Where, Why, Where? and Earth: May Contain Traces of Human. Music and science will combine with rock musical performances by Ologism; and a showcase of amazing soundscapes from Sacred Resonance. Our art exhibition is Illuminations by Andrew Baird.

14/12/12 12:49 PM

the adelaide REVIEW january 2013

15

business / finance

The Vatican

A New Year’s financial system resolution needed Taming the finance sector and generating decent jobs should be the New Year’s resolution for global leaders.

John Spoehr

D

espite the fact that the global economic crisis is inflicting enormous damage on communities around the globe, the causes of the calamity remain largely unresolved. That very little has been done to restrain finance capital from repeating the mistakes of the past, attests to the political and economic power of the sector and neoliberal ideological dogma. This power has not gone unchallenged but reform of any significance is not likely to occur in the absence of a great movement for change, one that pushes governments to regulate the banking and finance sector in the public interest.

The cost of inaction is unthinkable.

Trillions of taxpayers’ dollars have already

been used to prop up the banking and finance sector as well as deal with the consequences of the crisis on public finances and employment.

To try and prevent Australia from plunging into recession billions of dollars were injected by the Federal Government though the stimulus package. Banks and financial institutions were given a government guarantee to bolster confidence. Fortunately the strategy worked.

Early intervention helped us avoid joining the US and Europe in recession but it didn’t prevent the loss of tens of thousands of jobs in vulnerable sectors including finance, construction and manufacturing – we have lost around 10,000 finance sector and 100,000 manufacturing sector jobs since the Global Financial Crisis (GFC)

began. The impact of the GFC, particularly on the Australian exchange rate, is likely to fuel a further 80,000 manufacturing job losses over the next five years, according to the Prime Minister’s Taskforce on Manufacturing.

The story elsewhere is much more frightening.

The crisis engulfing the United States has led to the loss of around 6.5 millions jobs while in Europe 40 million jobs have been lost. This is a catastrophe that is generating great hardship and unrest, particularly in Europe where millions of young people’s hopes have been dashed.

Despite our exceptional performance, Australia remains vulnerable to the ongoing impacts of the crisis so long as the underlying causes of the crisis remain largely unaddressed and the neo-liberal economic solutions offered continue to fuel it. Austerity policies shift the burden of responsibility for the GFC away from the banking and finance sector to communities.

What is needed is a new international financial architecture that finances productivity and employment generating investment while heavily taxing and curbing the speculative excess that prevails in international financial markets. Separate markets for productive and speculative investment need to be created by subjecting highly speculative financial instruments to differential risk taxes as part of a global financial transactions tax regime.

Austerity policies must be abandoned and replaced by pro-employment strategies that stimulate rather than dampen growth. There is no shortage of productive work to be done as we confront the need to create more rewarding and secure jobs in a carbon-constrained world.

Global leadership is required to bring about a new economic and financial deal – one that tackles the interrelated problems of excessive high-risk financial speculation, corporate collapse and mass unemployment. I don’t normally look for inspiration from the Vatican but I recently came across the Pope’s World Day of Peace message, which I am inclined to quote, in part, to provide a moral dimension to the debate that might resonate for some. The passage focuses on employment as a fundamental good, a right if you like that is central to the well-being of individuals, families and communities. More than

this, the message provides further legitimacy, if it is needed, to the critique of unregulated finance capitalism. For those who find this uplifting and for others who are persuaded all the same, there is a pressing need to take up the challenge of advocating for a new global financial architecture. There is also a need to expose the folly and fundamental inequity of the policies of austerity that are being imposed on too many communities around the world, including in Australia where the Queensland Government has been the pace setter.

‘It is alarming to see hotbeds of tension and conflict caused by growing instances of inequality between rich and poor, by the prevalence of a selfish and individualistic mindset which also finds expression in an unregulated financial capitalism.

One of the social rights and duties most under threat today is the right to work. The reason for this is that labour and the rightful recognition of workers’ juridical status are increasingly undervalued, since economic development is thought to depend principally on completely free markets. Labour is thus regarded as a variable dependent on economic and financial mechanisms. In this regard, I would reaffirm that human dignity and economic, social and political factors, demand that we continue “to prioritise the goal of access to steady employment for everyone. If this ambitious goal is to be realised, one prior condition is a fresh outlook on work, based on ethical principles and spiritual values that reinforce the notion of work as a fundamental good for the individual, for the family and for society.

Corresponding to this good are a duty and a right that demand courageous new policies of universal employment.’ (Vatican, December 8, 2012) Bringing an end to the global economic and financial crisis demands a fundamental policy shift, one that will only be achieved when governments are subjected to overwhelming pressure for a fair and just international financial system.

Wishing you a very happy new year.

Associate Professor John Spoehr is the Executive Director of the Australian Workplace Innovation and Social Research Centre at the University of Adelaide

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16

the adelaide REVIEW january 2013

opinion

LETTER FROM TOKYO Alexander Downer

I

often bore people with my list of the 10 cities you have to see before you die. Cities like Rome and Paris, Istanbul and Rio de Janeiro, New York and Jerusalem. But no one would include a Japanese city in a list like that. Most of them were bombed to ashes during the closing stages of the Second World War, not least Tokyo. It was reduced to rubble.

Yet today modern Tokyo is a triumph. Its modern buildings are elegant, it has the best public transport system in the world, it is perfectly clean, the huge population is astonishingly polite. And the restaurants are stunning. No, Tokyo isn’t one of the 10 cities you have to see before you die but it is one of the world’s most under-rated cities.

Travel outside of Tokyo and the countryside is stunning. Wonderful trees, rolling countryside and looming over all is the symmetrical elegance of Mount Fuji. So when I think of what I love about Asia, Japan is a big part of it.

It’s also a country of strategic importance to Australia. Japan is democratic, liberal with a free press and it’s a democracy. What is more, Japan and Australia are America’s two most important allies in the East Asian hemisphere.

And then there’s trade. Japan is our secondly

largest export market. Yet there was almost no reporting in Australia of Japan’s general election on December 16. That would be fine if the result had been the re-election of the government. But it wasn’t. The opposition Liberal Democratic Party led by Shinzo Abe won in a landslide.

The new government will face serious challenges. For a start there’s the economy.

Japan has suffered from a prolonged period of economic stagnation coupled with a staggering level of public debt. Greek public debt has reached 150 percent of GDP. That’s pretty much brought the whole economy down.

In Japan, public debt is over 200 percent of GDP. Unlike the Greeks, the Japanese government funds 90 percent of its debt by borrowing from its own people. The Japanese are big savers, unlike Greeks. But still, a level of debt which is twice the size of GDP is a huge burden.

For years, Japanese governments have been borrowing from the public at an ever growing rate in order to stimulate the economy. It’s an interesting case study of how government spending is seldom the answer to economic stagnation. Structural reform is.

A few years ago, Japan elected one of its most impressive post-war prime ministers, Junichiro Koizumi. He had the courage to make structural reforms to the economy. But since his time, nothing much has happened – with one exception. The outgoing left of centre government legislated to increase the rate of GST. That’s not going to stimulate growth.

The Japanese economy certainly needs a dose of liberalisation. The rigid labour market

needs to become more flexible and the financial sector needs to be opened up. For the casual visitor to Japan, financial transactions can be primitive and confusing. That’s a symbol of a creaking, old fashioned banking system. And a banking system lies at the heart of the economy, as the world now knows.

So far, there’s been no indication from the new Prime Minister that he wants to make reforms of that kind. On the contrary; he seems to prefer looking for still more novel ways of stimulating the economy through looser monetary policy.

But Japan has another fundamental problem.

It has a shrinking population. So do the maths.

To generate economic growth, productivity has to grow pretty fast if the population is declining.

Aggregate working hours in Japan have fallen by 15 percent over the last two decades.

One obvious solution might be immigration.

But that has never been popular with the Japanese public. They prefer to maintain the country’s striking homogeneity.

If the economic challenges for the incoming government weren’t great enough, it also has to deal with the strategic implications of a rising China. Don’t under-estimate the task. Added to the historic distrust between the Japanese and Chinese people is the dispute over the ownership of the Senkaku or Diayou islands in the East China Sea. Both Japan and China are vigorously defending their claims to these uninhabited islands and incoming Prime Minister Abe says he will be uncompromising on this issue.

Now Japan is a long way from Australia. But it has a significant impact on our economy and

if the relationship between China and Japan becomes unstable that will affect us as well.

After all, China and Japan are the world’s second and third largest economies.

And public sentiment in Japan is changing.

Nationalism is becoming more pronounced and the public remain resistant to economic reform and immigration. Watching and working with Japan should be one of Australia’s top foreign policy priorities.

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Françoise Abraham’s “Frivole” On display at Burnside Village

burnsidevillage.com.au

the adelaide REVIEW january 2013

17

FEATURE

The Hawke’s global vision Author, intellectual and social scientist Professor Anthony Elliott is the new Director of Adelaide’s Hawke Research Institute, where he hopes to develop a more intensive global outlook for the largest Australian centre of social science research.

Christopher Sanders

“

I’ve been struck by the fact that the Hawke has always been very Adelaide-centric, and yes, it’s located in Adelaide but what I haven’t quite grasped is why our activities for the most part have been mostly only in Adelaide,” Professor Elliott, who was appointed in October, explains.

The Hawke Research Institute is the research body of the University of South Australia’s Hawke Centre, a community-focused body devoted to generating ideas and solutions to achieve cohesive, sustainable societies. “This Institute is now going to take Adelaide, as it were, around Australia for all the major events that we’re running from 2013 onwards. They will happen in Adelaide but they will go to other capital cities and they’ll start happening in Sydney, Melbourne and Brisbane and we’ll be co-badging these elsewhere. We will be seeking to bring, for instance, some of the best and the brightest. We’re launching early next year with

visiting speakers from Yale University, we’re bringing them here and there will be master classes and public lectures in Adelaide but then we take that to Sydney, still under the Hawke, to try and expand the operation.”

A former Chair of Sociology at Flinders University, Professor Elliott is the author of more than 25 books (including The New Individualism and Making the Cut) and was based in the UK where he gained his PhD from Cambridge and became Professor of Sociology at the University of Kent. “The Hawke has always been about vibrant, academic social science contributing to the public that it’s meant to serve,” Elliott says. “That is what my understanding of not only what the Hawke Centre, which of course has done so much in terms of promoting debate in Adelaide over the years with all of its high profile events not just public speaking, but the Hawke Centre is geared towards sponsoring and running exhibitions. The Institute is really meant to be about putting the latest, cutting edge social science and research

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Professor Anthony Elliott

from the humanities back into engagement with the public. That agenda, I think, slipped for a period, so what my directorship is about is trying to not only, in a sense, reconnect to that and to reinvigorate it but to actually try and lift the whole thing to another level.”

Professor Elliott says the Hawke will be focussed on improving the quality of public debate in Adelaide.

“This isn’t to say Adelaide needs any help with its public debate because, of course, it has been a city that is well recognised for its staging of events and it’s the festival city. I know there have been various debates about its status in terms of culture and where it ranks against the other states, but I think where the Hawke can hopefully make a difference is in the types of debates we’re going to have. For instance, next year we’re joining forces with the Academy of the Social Sciences in Australia, which

is arguably the most prestigious and central body of social science research in this country and we’re going to run a national asylum summit. You can’t get a bigger political issue; you can’t get a more fraught and difficult political issue at the moment than asylum. So often it’s a debate that gets reduced too quickly to what’s called Australia’s border protection security. The Hawke is about trying to engineer a more sophisticated debate. We will be bringing people (not only people from all around the country) to Adelaide in June of next year for this debate, we will also be bringing international speakers from North America, Europe and Asia, because, of course, it’s a global debate. We want to make sure that we get a kind of space for the different political positions to be there and to connect it to the latest research in social science, to contribute back to what’s actually happening at the level of public debate.”

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the adelaide REVIEW january 2013

FEATURE

Future market

launch into space Adelaide Youth Orchestra’s 2013 season was officially launched by South Australian NASA astronaut Dr Andrew Thomas AO on Thursday, December 13 at the Adelaide Airport Terminal.

Our fresh food hub, the Adelaide Central Market, is a feast of local and global flavours and is a tourist destination, as well as a shopping precinct. With the Adelaide Central Market Authority’s inaugural CEO, Carl Partridge, settled into his job, The Adelaide Review talks the future of the CBD’s most lively shopping destination.

Photos: Jonathan van der Knaap

Christopher Sanders

A

fter 143 years, the Central Market is more than an Adelaide institution.

Visiting chefs usually say their first stop when in town is the market. With a gang of fruit and veg stalls, speciality produce shops, cafes and smallgoods holdings providing food from South Australia and around the globe, there is no place like it. Adelaide loves ‘our market’ despite grumblings over the years regarding the car park, its image and stallholder unrest. Then there are the farmers’ markets, which could be seen as a threat to the Central Market, as they are the hip places to buy fresh produce from with their sustainable ethos allowing consumers to buy direct from the farmer.

Partridge, who is from the UK previously working at Premier League soccer club Fulham, The Oval Cricket Ground and the Royal Agriculture Society of England, was announced as the inaugural CEO of the new Central Market Authority in May, which is chaired by Judy Potter. The Authority’s aim is to create a vibrant, commercially sustainable and engaging food market experience. When Partridge took the job, he said his first issue was to separate

the facts from the emotions.

“Once you kind of ignore the emotions – especially in this place as this place is full of emotions, and I’m really emotional about it – but the first thing to understand was who our public are and why do they come here. The next thing to understand was how do people shop in metropolitan Adelaide. So there were two things – the real world outside of the market and the real world inside of the market.

The approach that we took was let’s see how people conduct their lives, as it currently is to give us the best direction. The things I was being asked from traders and media were the usual questions, which are: ‘Is rent going to go up? Are car parking prices going to go up? What’s happening with opening hours?’ And my bit was none of that is of relevance until we can understand the real world and if I was to ask you the question: ‘If a place opened on a Sunday would you shop?’ You might say ‘yes’ but my real question should be: ‘Where do you currently shop in Adelaide?’”

A recent survey completed by the Market (quizzing 3000 Market shoppers plus 1500 people outside of the Market) showed that 66 percent of Adelaideans shop at the Market at least once a

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the adelaide REVIEW january 2013

19

opinion year; eight percent of all Adelaide’s fruit and veg are bought at the market as well as 12 percent of our city’s seafood. But what do people want from the Central Market?

“We know that people want more tastings.

They want more of the demos about how to do things with different products. They want more food on the go. They want to know more about the food’s history and which is South Australian produce and which isn’t. They also want to know more of a story about things like Marco’s [Mushroom Man] mushrooms that come from the Adelaide Hills, they also want to know a bit more of that history, so that’s good for us. We’re doing some things at the moment that’ll show the market is unique.

It’s absolutely unique. If you go to the top of the escalators we’ve relocated all of the posters that were up there and they are now big blackboards all designed by local artists and they’ll tell you what’s in season, how to use it and, for example, if you buy asparagus what does it go with?”

Food SA recently launched the Regional and Seasonal program, which will showcase local producers and products at the Market. In an age where the media and celebrity chefs are pushing fresh in-season produce this is a smart move, especially since farmers’ markets are currently trending, as they sell in-season local produce only, which you buy direct from the farmer while the Central Market sells food from around the globe, as well as local produce. But Partridge wants to work with the farmers’ markets and is supportive of them.

“We meet different demands. We’ve got stuff that’s absolutely in season in Australia now and we’ve also got products that are in season around the world. Where we differ from the farmers’ markets is we get access to products, especially Marco, that just expands the culinary experience. Marco has got his Adelaide Hills mushrooms plus truffles from France.”

Will there be new stalls?

“The challenge is all the stalls are full. We’re looking at some pop-up stalls. There is a team in discussion about that at the moment. We want to do it in a very traditional away; hand carts with little canopies. I’m trying to find a South Australian company who can make those for me.”

adelaidecentralmarket.com.au

MODERN TIMES An enlightenment inspired by dreaming Andrew Hunter

L

anguages are increasingly viewed as little more than instrument of trade. Language learning is no longer seen as a key to developing a deeper understanding of different cultures, practices and beliefs.

Linguist Nicholas Evans asserted in his book Dying Words: Endangered Languages and What They Have to Tell Us that there were around 250 living Indigenous languages spoken in Australia two centuries ago. The number of living Indigenous languages was reduced to 150 by the 1980s. There are now less than 70, only a portion of which are regularly used. It is likely that this number will continue to fall. This represents the most rapid loss of language in human history.

Language is a primary carrier of knowledge.

Indigenous languages contain wisdom accumulated over millennia. Australia will not fulfil our potential as a modern nation until we drop our intellectual pail into the vast well of Indigenous understanding that has accumulated since the Dreaming. We need to urgently capture and preserve those languages that sit on the precipice of oblivion.

The 20th anniversary of Paul Keating’s Redfern address was widely acknowledged in the Australian media recently. In the address, Keating stated that “as complex as our contemporary identity is, it cannot be separated from Aboriginal Australia” and later referred to a people whose “genius and resilience maintained a culture here through 50,000 years or more, through changes to the climate and environment.”

Australia’s capacity to meet crucial contemporary challenges may depend on how we use this unprecedented depth of experience and understanding. Keating called on nonAboriginal Australians to “find just solutions to the problems which beset the first Australians.” It is time, perhaps, to acknowledge that Indigenous understanding can help find solutions to problems that have beset our country?

It sometimes appears that action on climate change may be beyond the wisdom of the current generation. Serious scientific bodies have now been joined by organisations such as

the World Bank in predicting that temperatures will rise by between four and six degrees over the course of the current century. Unfortunately, public discourse in Australia today reveals an increasingly distrust of scientific analysis, has little hunger for empiricism and abandons any sense of individual, inter-generational or international responsibility. This represents a diminishing respect for the dominant features of post-Enlightenment western thinking.

Like most societies influenced by European culture, modern Australia owes much to the Enlightenment. The Enlightenment spawned an intellectual tradition that embraced science and the idea that technology could be used to improve the quality of life. The application of reason has been a prominent feature of public discourse since the Enlightenment, when it was used to emancipate people from the intellectual absolutism of the church.

Unfortunately, it seems that another form of intellectual absolutism is now emerging - one that emphasises material progress and favours deregulated, free markets. Uncritical acceptance that material progress provides the most accurate indication of a society’s status and achievements will make it difficult to achieve the paradigm change necessary to arrest environmental degradation. Something more is needed to deal with the problems faced by the current generation.

Australia’s Indigenous cultures hold a common commitment to the perpetual protection, maintenance and renewal of the land and its environment. Indeed, it is understood to be one’s moral duty. A sincere contemplation of western intellectual traditions and Indigenous

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experience, knowledge and beliefs may bring about a natural intellectual balance in Australia.

Unfortunately, such a balance has to this point proved elusive.

An Australian Enlightenment inspired by the Dreaming holds such a promise, but a serious commitment to preserving the existing Indigenous languages would be necessary to reconcile Indigenous with European traditions of thought. When the last speaker of a language without a written tradition passes, the language also dies. There is no prospect of revival.

Learning Asian languages has recently been encouraged so that Australians can fully participate in the transformative ‘Asian Century’.

For Australia to play a more powerful role in Asia, it is equally important that we can summon understanding of the diverse intellectual and lived experiences of all Australian peoples. The civilisational values we contribute to the region’s evolution should reflect the rich diversity of experience and learning that has taken place on the land we now know as ‘Australia’. Our potential as a nation in Asia would be enriched and the way in which we are viewed by our neighbours positively transformed.

A harmonious balance between seemingly disparate schools of thought may yet hold the key to a sustainable and prosperous nation in the future but when we allow Indigenous languages to die, we limit our capacity to cope with challenges that immediately confront us, such as climate change.

We cannot sit by the well and watch it dry as the number of living Indigenous languages diminishes.

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the adelaide REVIEW january 2013

fashion

Vintage Inc The cult of the individual reigns supreme at Adelaide vintage retailer Claire Inc, and word is spreading as far away as America and the UK. Belinda Humphris

Nina Bertok

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ith clients including pop stars Lily Allen and MIA, as well as celebrities like Natalie Portman and Melissa George, Claire Inc’s penchant for one-off collectable pieces from inaccessible fashion labels has seen the online-only store skyrocket in popularity in 2012.

Even bigger things are in store in the New Year, according to owner Belinda Humphris.

“We’re just gearing up to do a new collection in 2013, probably sometime in March,” she says.

“We’ll be doing a media launch for it as well as an official launch somewhere in February and March, so we’re looking forward to having the collection finalised. The idea behind it is very 90s-based and it’s focused on the origins of branding and slogans, so that’s pretty much the theme. It’s never exactly easy to predict what the next big thing is going to be in terms of trends – nothing that ever comes out

is truly a brand new trend, everything is always influenced by the past. However, at this stage it’s looking like the trend is going to be continuing with the 90s, which is massive right now and has been for a while. I can’t actually see it going away for quite a while.”

The current trend, in fact, still focuses on the 80s almost just as much as the 90s, according to Humphris... So what is it about those specific eras that have had such an impact not only on the fashion industry but on your average consumer? The boldness and brashness that defined the two decades, says Humphris, the mass appeal is in bright, over-the-top colours and exaggerated, bizarre patterns.

“Those eras are pretty unique in that they were so bold and brash. The clothes were so over-the-top – especially in the 80s more so than the 90s – and I think a lot of people like that kind of thing, including myself. It’s no-holds-barred dressing and it’s easy to see why a lot of the trends from that time have

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carried through to today. Fashion goes in cycles, so you get vintage but with a modern twist.”

According to Humphris, UK rapper MIA in particular has an “amazing taste” in hard-to-find vintage Versace designs, and can often be spotted in Claire Inc pieces during her Australian tours.

“I’ve seen MIA wear something on stage and I was like, ‘That’s mine!’ I’ve seen a few pieces on Melissa George as well, though I didn’t sell it to her, I think her stylist must have bought it for her.

Same with a famous LA stylist who looks after Natalie Portman... Usually it’s pretty easy to spot because our stuff is so rare. Another customer is Lily Allen who has decided to leave singing for fashion. It’s a bizarre career decision to leave music and become a fashion retailer but she’s got great taste for beautiful vintage design and old amazing stuff. She’s bought a lot of stuff from me when she started designing her retail store Lucy In Disguise.”

While Humphris’ biggest customer base still remains in Australia, increasingly demand is coming from overseas, including places like the UK and even South Africa.

“About 70 percent of them are Australian-

FASHION RENDEZVOUS Gilles Street Market Sunday, January 20 (10am – 4pm) 91 Gilles Street, Adelaide gillesstreetmarket.com.au

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For fab vintage and pre-loved fashion including the latest from local emerging designers, check out the Gilles Street Market - Adelaide’s premier fashion and design market showcase. DJs spin the tunes alongside delicious food vendors and over 90 stalls of fashion and accessories.

based, many in Sydney and Melbourne, but a lot of them are in the UK, Europe, the US, Canada, South Africa, some pretty obscure places too.

We’re still Adelaide-based but Adelaide is not a huge retail town, there isn’t a huge market place here, that’s why we’re online-only. The advantage is that it means we’re open 24/7 and not constricted by time and place. The disadvantage of that is that people can’t come in and try things on. There’s nothing quite like seeing the joy on people’s faces and having that feedback and seeing them jump up and down in excitement when they’ve found that perfect piece.

We do have open days sometimes but retail is going through a tough time at the moment, so it’s probably not the best time to expand just yet. It would be amazing to do it a bit later, maybe even interstate just because most of our clientele are over there, though I’d rather not move because Adelaide is a fantastic place.”

claireinc.com

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the adelaide REVIEW january 2013

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scuttlebutt Ten years later, despite some improvements, in 2012 similar risks apply. In the 2012 (second) report, Prof Gehl warned: “The inconsistent bicycle amenities in the city centre do not invite or encourage people to use bicycles as a primary daily transportation. The inconsistent system has forced people to ride in between cars and buses, making it unsafe and hazardous for bicycles.”

In light of this, a city bikes hire system, which Town Hall describes as ‘council’s Adelaide free city bike scheme’ but is actually run by Bike SA, invites users to risk the hazards. About 100,000 hirer cyclists have pedalled around the city over the six years since it began in 2005, many from overseas or interstate who anticipate safer conditions similar to their home patches. During 2011–12, 15,000 bikes were hired. Bike SA’s contract’s small print absolves itself of any damages or injuries claims.

A classic illustration of the challenges to city transport planners – and the politics – emerged when August 2012 changes were announced that implemented bus priority ‘express lanes’ in the east-west CBD main thoroughfare, Grenfell (which becomes) Currie Street, in order to reduce congestion caused by heavy cross-city car volumes. The casualty of the infrastructure change was the removal of most bicycle lanes and channelling of buses and cycles into one lane – a highly dangerous outcome. Two months later, similar new bus priority lanes from Greenhill Road to South Terrace and from West Terrace east up Gouger Street created similar hazards. Buses 1; cyclists 0. The initiatives were governmentinspired and council endorsed, contrasting Gehl’s philosophy on cyclists, but complementing his

ideas on reducing traffic congestion. In the new Smart Move Strategy, illustrating yet another example of government policy over-riding local government’s responsibilities to reduce road hazards, Town Hall recommends developing another 15 kilometres of bus priority lanes.

More government-inspired ideas emerged in November 2012, in a document titled Place Shaping Framework for Adelaide. On cycling, it suggested the now-accepted idea of safe, separate bike lanes and associated reduced speed zones, but added a wacky suggestion to “pilot Australia’s first helmetoptional zones” in the city and park lands. The medical fraternity’s apoplexy is not recorded.

Gehl’s message was spelled out clearly in his 2012 report under the headline: “Hard times for bicyclists in the city centre.”

“Bicycle infrastructure is found in certain locations in the city centre, but does not create a coherent network ... the system is very inconsistent”. Those words were signed off in December 2011, 10 months before the Grenfell Street-Currie Street changes and the recommendation to develop more bus priority lanes – weakening a previously (marginally) safer road environment. The creation of systemprompted, government-initiated safety hazards, worsening a previous situation, highlights a very poor understanding of cycling safety issues in the government offices. Many other sites across the city and on its edges also leave cyclists highly vulnerable.

Despite the best of intentions, and the attention of a world expert, twice in a decade, the city still has a long way to go, despite government and council cycling spin every summer.

SCUTTLEBUTT

As Adelaide’s 15th Tour Down Under looms, there’s a disconnect between spin and reality about cycling safety in the city.

Sir Montefiore Scuttlebutt

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arnings 10 years ago that partially implementing cycling lanes in the city would be hazardous to cyclists have been overwhelmed by detail in a major report released recently. Despite a media focus on Adelaide’s city love affair with cycling, hyped annually when the big bike race comes to town, the city street reality is different, and many cyclists remain unaware of the dangers.

All agree that Adelaide is the perfect city for bikes, none more than the Copenhagen-based expert in city redesign, Professor Jan Gehl whom the city paid handsomely in 2002, and again in 2011, to write two reports on how the city might be (among other things) made more bike friendly.

In the 10 years between reports, however, and since Town Hall installed another 33kms of new on-street cycle lanes and hundreds of bike rails, a full overhaul of road infrastructure for safe cycling remains a distant objective. The city’s grid remains incomplete and cycling hazards abound.

Adelaide’s Lord Mayor, Stephen Yarwood, elected in 2010, is a cyclist and inner-city resident.

He makes much of the proposals in the Gehl report and speaks passionately of the cycling opportunities. But Gehl’s warnings persist.

City administrators, aware of the politics, got in ahead of the release of Gehl’s second report with their own blueprint, in May 2012 – the City of Adelaide Integrated Movement Strategy

2012–22. It extracted four recommendations – with attribution – from Gehl’s unreleased report, signed off in December 2011 but only released by the state government in October 2012. Town Hall’s report featured many ideas and aspirations. Its release, ahead of the Gehl report, highlighted a plan to further pursue cycling policy implementation to meet Gehl’s and the Lord Mayor’s aspirations. Several weeks ago it was rebadged as Smart Move Strategy, featuring beefed up cycling plans. But contents revealed that Town Hall allowed itself a full 10 years to achieve the objectives. Its Bicycle Action Plan this year will cost $1.16 million, well below the amount needed to realise Gehl’s safety vision.

It will spend an additional $198,400 promoting Smart Move; in particular, mode 2: ‘Safe Cycling’.

Ten years ago Gehl’s warning was explicit.

“The [council’s cycle lane] effort and intention is good but more needs to be done in order to create a good cycle network. Today [2002] there is no such network but bits and pieces of cycle lanes in the city centre which do not constitute a joint system. Cycling [in Adelaide] is not an integrated part of the city culture and motorists are not used to look out for cyclists. As such, the cyclists find themselves in unclear, undefined zones and tend to ride aggressively in order to be noticed by motorists. This behaviour, by the way, often causes conflicts with pedestrians at footpaths and at intersections.”

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the adelaide REVIEW january 2013

win / feature

WIN! FOR YOUR CHANCE TO WIN, ENTER YOUR DETAILS AT ADELAIDEREVIEW.COM.AU

The Secret Garden The Arts Theatre Saturday, February 2, 8pm The Secret Garden is an old musical theatre favourite. The Gilbert and Sullivan Society have put together a stellar SA cast featuring Carolyn Ferrie and Mark Oates.

Win a double pass.

Limbo The Garden Of Unearthly Delights – Paradiso Spiegeltent Friday, February 15, 8.45pm

The Secret Garden

Life of Pi

Adelaide will host the world premiere of Limbo, a brand new show from the creators of the critically acclaimed and award-winning Cantina. Disconcerting, thrilling, exotic - audiences should immerse themselves in Limbo before it slips away from The Garden, heading to London for a five-month season. Win a double pass.

Various cinemas Opens Tuesday, January 1

Michelle and The Gentlemen’s Club

Win tickets to Life of Pi, a film about a young man who survives a disaster at sea and is hurtled into an epic journey of adventure and discovery. While cast away, he forms an unexpected connection with another survivor... a fearsome Bengal tiger.

The Governor Hindmarsh Sunday, February 17, 6pm

Hitchcock Various cinemas Opens Thursday, January 10 Win a double pass to Hitchcock, a love story between influential filmmaker Alfred Hitchcock and wife Alma Reville during the filming of Psycho in 1959.

Crush Wine and Food Festival 2013 Cellar doors - Adelaide Hills Wine Region Sunday, January 27 Wine and food will combine with art, music and fashion at the annual Crush Festival, including exclusive events showcasing fashion icon Paolo Sebastian, renowned chef Simon Bryant and unique wine blogger Michael Ellis in the Adelaide Hills Wine Region. Win a double VIP pass.

Nadeah Space Theatre, Adelaide Festival Centre Thursday, January 17, 9.30pm Win a double pass to French-Aussie Parisbased Nadeah, who is set to tear up the stage with her unique style of eclectic pop, infused with the wildcat spirit of Brigitte Bardot.

Nadeah wowed the 2012 Adelaide Cabaret Festival and sold out unforgettable shows in Melbourne and Perth, showing the only thing more audacious than her songwriting skill is her powerful, unpredictable stage presence.

El Caballo Blanco - The Dance of the White Stallions Adelaide Entertainment Centre Saturday, February 2, 2pm The magnificent white stallions of Spain are dancing their way to Adelaide for one show only! El Caballo Blanco: The Dance of the White Stallions will feature a number of performances involving the Andalusian, Friesian, Lipizzaner and Arabian breeds. The event is dedicated to showing off the amazing beauty and maneuvers these horses are capable of. Win a double pass.

In this debut solo performance by one of South Australia’s most acclaimed voices, Michelle Pearson will be backed by a cookin’ quartet of Adelaide’s most eligible gentlemen and an orchestra handpicked and directed by the award-winning Peter Johns. A sultry suite of cabaret, jazz and blues, musical theatre and Michelle’s unique take on Australian rock. Win tickets.

Barry Morgan – Organ is Not a Dirty Word The Garden Of Unearthly Delights – The Campanile Sunday, February 17, 7.30pm The World of Organs Superstore is under threat of closing down. Is this the end of Barry and his Golden Syrup sounds?

They’ll have to pry his Hammond Aurora from his rhine-stoned-fingers first! And not before one last serenade from Skyhooks to Lady Gaga. Win a double pass.

The Candy Butchers The Garden Of Unearthly Delights – The Big Top Sunday, February 17, 8pm You can win tickets to the show that heralded a renaissance within the new circus movement! Refreshingly dark, high-risk human spectacle blending the perverse with the poetic to create circus with a heart… a twisted black one!

Tom Thum – Beating the Habit The Garden Of Unearthly Delights – Paradiso Spiegeltent Wednesday, February 20, 10.15pm Direct from a massive international tour including London, Edinburgh, Brisbane, Germany and Singapore; the phenomenal Beatbox addict and star of Tom Tom Crew, returns to the Garden with his 2012 sell-out Fringe hit. Win tickets to the winner of the Adelaide Fringe Underbelly award.

Grimmer Tales On the 200th anniversary of the printing of the Grimm Brothers’ legendary collection of dark tales, The Fairy Tales of the Brothers Grimm, Australian author Valerie Volk’s twisted adaptation on the classic stories takes the ‘grim’ factor to another level.

Nina Bertok

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er third book, Even Grimmer Tales: Not for the Faint-Hearted, takes much-loved children’s fairytales like Cinderella, Snow White, Sleeping Beauty and Little Red Riding Hood, and completely flips them on their head.

“Just about everybody in the western world is familiar with the Grimm fairytales,” Volk offers.

“Most us were even brought up on these stories.

It continues with the next generation with new movies like Red Riding Hood, Snow White and The Huntsman and some of the Disney films too.

I originally started out not intending to write this book at all – I was writing something more major – but I was really drawn to poetry and fairy stories while at the same time realising that writing about happy little fairies dashing around was really not my style. So it began when I took the Little Red Riding Hood story and thought, ‘Okay, let’s see what we can do with this’ – that turned into Red.” Whereas the Grimm original told of an innocent little girl stalked by a hungry wolf, Volk’s version transforms the tale into that of a homicidal paedophile haunting a dark forest. And while Volk admits that some may find the new twist horrifying and shocking, in reality, her stories aren’t that much more controversial or gory as half the shows we watch on our own television screens on a nightly basis.

“There is nothing in this book that you wouldn’t see on shows like Criminal Minds, Bones and CSI,” Volk points out. “This is our daily viewing. It’s nothing that unusual or that perverted in comparison... It’s just that I’m putting them in the context of a Grimm tale. The original Grimm Brothers stories were actually even bloodier and more horrific than the ones that we’ve come to know over the years. When they first came out in 1812 they provoked a fair degree of horror because of some of the details they went into. The Brothers Grimm started out by putting together a collection of German folktales to collect tales of cultural heritage. They called them ‘Children’s and Household Stories’ – I don’t think they set out for them to be purely children’s stories by any means. Then later they realised children were reading them too and after that they watered the stories down quite a bit.”

Whereas the Brothers Grimm watered down the sexual elements within their stories and kept a lot of the violence, Volk explains she took on the opposite approach...

“I’ve taken the overt violence out but I’ve left the sex scenes in,” she laughs. “But it’s not even purely about that – the stories are essentially ironic and many of them are quite funny and witty. The reaction has been, ‘Gasp! Good heavens!’ followed

by a recognition that there is a degree of humour in there too. What I’ve found interesting in my research of fairy tales in general is how they often mirrored the psychological states of a human being’s mind. If you think about it, so many fairy tales involve a dark forest as well as the relationship between parents and children. For example, in the first version of Snow White there wasn’t a ‘wicked stepmother’ – it was the girl’s own mother who was so jealous of her daughter’s beauty that she took her out to the forest to lose her. These reveal a lot about psychological states – for the children, it’s about the fear of abandonment.”

An award-winning writer, Volk claims Even Grimmer Tales has taught her something new about her own craft after all these years...

“I’ve realised that I really enjoy writing in the first person and actually becoming the character I’m writing about. I just think it has more impact when you write in verse format. I’ve been published for my poetry and short stories, I’ve been published in journals, I’ve won a number of awards for short stories along the way but, for some reason, when I turned to a longer, more major work, it seemed to become a verse novel rather than prose. I found a wonderful quote from a Czech writer who said, ‘The characters in my novels are my own unrealised possibilities, each one has crossed a border that I myself have circumvented’. Just because your characters have done horrific things, it doesn’t mean that you would ever dream of doing them, though you are still able to inhabit them.”

Even Grimmer Tales: Not for the Faint-Hearted is published by Interactive Press

the adelaide REVIEW january 2013

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feature

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the adelaide REVIEW january 2013

performing arts

Where art, politics and communication collide

This month The Adelaide Review’s guide to January’s highlight performing arts events

The Transatlantics Friday, January 11, 9.30pm Festival Centre, Space Theatre

Saturday January 26th

10am - 4pm, Cost $30

Brougham Place Uniting Church Hall

Cnr Frome Rd & Stanley St. Nth. Adelaide Contact briarjune@gmail.com or 0412489714 for bookings and further information No auditions

middle of 2012, now is the perfect time to catch Adelaide’s premier deep funk and soul outfit that continues to fly the flag of Motown and Stax.

The Transatlantics

Home seeing the light of the day in the

Nadeah Thursday, January 17, 9.30pm Adelaide Festival Centre, Space Theatre nadeah.com

A hit at the 2012 Adelaide Cabaret Festival, Nadeah stunned audiences with her sophisticated pop. The Paris-based Aussie will be back at the Adelaide Festival Centre as part of its Sessions program.

Zephyr Quartet

Nadeah

with Briar Eyers

With their second album Find My Way

Featured guest at the 2013 Adelaide Festival, Laurie Anderson appears with Kronos Quartet in the Festival Theatre, gives her solo show Dirtday! at the Dunstan Playhouse, and exhibits selected works at the Anne & Gordon Samstag Art Museum. The Adelaide Review was granted a rare chance to speak with the avantgarde musical star.

Friday, January 18, 6.30pm Adelaide Festival Centre, Space Theatre zephyrquartet.com

Adelaide’s Zephyr Quartet will perform their unique versions of contemporary pop classics with the string quartet reproducing tracks by The Cure, Wilco, Neil Young and Sigur Ros.

A Day on the Green

Zephyr Quartet

ACAPPELLA GOSPEL WORKSHOP

thetransatlantics.com.au

Elvis Costello, The Sunnyboys, Jo Jo Sep & The Falcons, Tex Perkin & The Dark Horses and Stephen Cummings Sunday, January 27

Laurie Anderson

Leconfield Wines, McLaren Vale adayonthegreen.com.au

Graham Strahle

Elvis Costello leads a massive lineup for the first A Day on the Green of 2013. Joining the eclectic British troubadour is a magnitude of legendary Aussie acts including the reformed Alone With You creators The Sunnyboys.

Elvis Costello

Find the Soul in your Voice

El Caballo Blanco - The Dance of the White Stallions Saturday, February 2, 2pm Adelaide Entertainment Centre elcaballoblanco.com.au

The white stallions of Spain return to Adelaide under the guidance of riding master Rene Gasser to showcase the beauty and maneuvers of the Andalusian, Friesian and Lipizzaner breeds. only.

The white stallions

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A

pioneer of performance art and one of the true originals of the experimental arts scene, Laurie Anderson became a pop icon in the 1980s with that extraordinary hit, O Superman.

Minimalism’s first chart success, this song’s obscure, breathy vocals and mesmeric oscillating harmonies immediately elevated her to cult status. And in one of the Adelaide Festival’s more adroit moves, she was snaffled up in 1986 in what became one of the event’s most impressive multimedia shows.

Now she is back, more politically charged than ever, and wanting to tell the world what is wrong with society, technology, and hamburger chains.

A modern-day troubadour with her finger on the pulse of contemporary life, she belongs to the Dylan-esque school that observes the world from a street corner: she critiques consumerist society by holding a mirror up to us all.

Anderson’s solo Festival show, Dirtday! had its genesis in New York’s Occupy Wall Street protest

the adelaide REVIEW january 2013

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performing arts

Laurie Anderson and Kronos Quartet

movement a year ago. It is a series of monologues combining song and poetry laced with pesky, angst-ridden social invective decrying corporate greed. She describes it as a “movie-like” show that catapults the listener into a hallucinatory, future-is-now depiction of modern society.

“Dirtday! started up as a solo violin thing, with all sorts of scraping and crunching noises,” Anderson says. “Then it turned into a Wall Street, Occupier Art kind of statement. Wall Street was about doing things your own way, with altruism at its core – cooperation not competition. Words started drifting in and it became increasingly

word-orientated. I also wanted to analyse social and political situations, which I find fascinating.

From this idea of word, all sorts of stories came into the work – dreams, ideas about evolution, cities and portraits of people. Music is still there, but it became more supportive.”

Disdainful of technology but paradoxically one who has utilised it heavily throughout her career, she says audiences won’t see stacks of black boxes on stage. “You won’t see that, just a laptop here or there. It’s been exciting to get this show down to a few foot pedals. I’m tired of being a roadie; I’d rather play music than lug boxes.”

On the Festival’s opening day, Anderson will perform Duets on Ice, an avant-gardist work for which she was best known in the early days of New York’s experimental scene. For this she dons ice skates and stands on two blocks of ice while she plays altered violin. The piece ends when the ice melts. “It’s a very old work from the 70s,” explains Anderson. “The violin has a speaker inside it, although this time it will be a digital descendant of that. The concept will be the same though – loop-based and spanning a long timeframe. One never knows when is it over since it doesn’t have a beginning, middle or end.”

What happens if we have a hot March in Adelaide? “I’ll compensate if the ice melts too fast,” she whimsically replies. “Maybe I’ll use some roller skates.”

If Anderson’s idiosyncrasies have forced her down a narrow path of eclecticism, they have also seen her team up with an extraordinary range of collaborators, from novelist William S. Burroughs to Jonathan Demme, Brian Eno and Peter Gabriel. Next is Kronos Quartet: the fruits of these pioneering experimentalists collaborating for the first time will be seen on March 2.

Anderson will play keyboard, loaded with stored sounds, and recite a lot of rapidly spoken text. “It will be a combination of things: improvisations, words, stories,” she says. “I’ll try something that tells real stories, but really fast, and they’ll play. So far we’ve tried lots of things and have found ourselves in a really interesting place. I’ve found I can read faster than I ever thought, using alphabets of your own, symbols and contexts, not necessarily individual words.

It’s just how we might walk down the street and see a panoply of signs, lights and people. We see how things resonate. This work does not have a lot of meaning inside; listeners will wrap their own meaning over it. We find it has some resonance for my life, your life. We realise one is looking for something. We’ll see.”

“Kronos are also great improvisers, which means they come up with beautiful things. I’ll sing a little something and I find they’ve already arranged it.

They know how a string quartet should sound.”

Is it harder these days for artists to pursue an eclectic path? “Yes,” she replies. “But there is no reason why one can’t go back and forth in one’s ideas. Staying in one’s own group is not good.

It would be like debating whether Starbucks or McDonald’s coffee is better. One realises one is such a sucker thinking like this. It’s like the record companies insisting you’re supposed to be an electro-acoustic musician, an experimentalist, a minimalist, a postmodernist or whatever else. I’m not trying to mourn the death of the artist, but I do think it is tougher today to get it out there.”

Laurie Anderson and Kronos Quartet, Festival Theatre, Saturday, March 2; Dirtday! at the Dunstan Playhouse, Sunday, March 3; The Language of the Future, at the Anne & Gordon Samstag Museum of Art, Friday, March 1 to Friday, April 19 adelaidefestival.com.au

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the adelaide REVIEW january 2013

performing arts

Ben Sollee Cello player Ben Sollee, not unlike fellow Americans Yo-Yo Ma and Julianna Barwick, is taking the classical instrument into different territories by giving it a new voice and a contemporary sound.

Robert Dunstan

S

“Oh, I’d picked it up at school in fourth grade and it made a bunch of weird noises,” Sollee laughs when asked how he came to the cello.

“That’s pretty much the reason I stuck with it because I found you could do anything with it. I thought it was something like a stunt instrument that I could use to make wacky sounds to get attention.

“And then I was told the cello was only intended to make classical music,” he continues. “But I’d always struggled with what classical music meant to me and meant to my life. And the cello is simply a box of wood with strings so I don’t see why I can’t play Ben Sollee

R&B music on it or folk music or bluegrass or even hip hop. It’s a very versatile instrument.

It’s like a Swiss army knife.”

Other artists taking part in Sessions include Jo

people as Daniel Martin Moore.

“Bill Cosby!” Sollee immediately says of the

Lawry, Wendy Matthews, Spanish instrumental

Sollee, known for his political activism, and

American comedian, actor, musician and television

combo Los Coronas, Casey Donovan and the

who recently released Half Made Man, suggests

producer when asked if there is anyone he has a

Michelle Nicolle Quartet, while So Frenchy

that collaborations happen quite organically.

hankering to collaborate with in the future.

So Chic will be well represented by Sessions

“In the case of working with Abigial

“I don’t know if it will ever happen but if I

performances from Nadeah, Chapelieur Fou,

Washburn, it was that she was looking for

get it out there enough, it may,” he concludes

Carmen Maria Vega and Revolver.

a cellist and some friends hooked us up,”

with a laugh.

Sollee, who has played with American band

he reveals. “So we ended up writing music

ollee, who wowed audiences at Port

My Morning Jacket and whose music has been

together and travelling the world. And that

Fairy Folk Festival in 2012, is now

featured in television show Weeds, released his

later expanded into The Sparrow Quartet where

returning to our shores accompanied

debut solo album, Learning to Bend, in 2008 after

I found two wonderful mentors in Bela Fleck

Ben Sollee

by Jordan Ellis who will be playing

working with banjo players Bela Fleck and Amy

and Casey Driessen so we’ve also continued to

Space Theatre, Adelaide Festival Centre,

drums along with an analogue synthesier and

Washburn and violinist Casey Driessen under

work together over the years. And that’s been

at 8pm

which will have the duo performing at Sessions

the name Abigail Washington & The Sparrow

great for me because Bela is such a wonderful

Wednesday, January 16

in January as part of Adelaide Festival Centre’s

Quartet. Since then he has released a series of

musician who is always coming up with new

bensollee.com

comprehensive, month-long festival of live music.

solo albums as well as collaborated with such

ideas. So he’s been a big influence.

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the adelaide REVIEW january 2013

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performing arts Sam Wright

Moving Music During festival time, the people of Adelaide are used to seeing the weird and the wacky taking up the streets.

But 200 people walking down Hindley Street on an April evening, lead by a man in a safari suit? That’s unexpected.

Jane Howard

“ Moving Music Saturday, January 19 facebook.com/musicthatmoves

I’ve walked down some brave places in a safari suit,” says Sam Wright, “and yeah, you get that look.”

Wright is the director of Moving Music; a music-gig-meets-walking-tour that started in January 2012. When we spoke, Wright was gearing up for the third Moving Music – and the largest one yet. “It’s this encapsulating bubble that you exist in for a brief three hours and then it’s gone,” he says. “But for this one it’s more than three hours. It’s like 10 hours. Shit. It will work.”

For Wright, Moving Music was the marrying

of two ideas: placing musicians on the streets, which he did when producing the web series and then feature length documentary 6 on the Street, and seeing Adelaide in a new light, through participating in en route, a theatre work for one that takes the participant on a tour of their city.

“I thought I knew my city”, Wright told me. “They completely threw upon new light for me and I was like ‘wow’. People from another city can do that for me: I want to be able to do that for the people that live in my city as well. Let them have the same experience.”

In the first two events, Wright and his team kept it relatively small – three bands, three locations, and three hours, with Adelaide design collective Fascination Street working on creating installations at each of the locations.

This January, Moving Music gets a little bit bigger: Wright and Fascination Street will be facilitating the presentation of eight bands in eight locations, and now with eight visual artists thrown into the mix. “My aim in life,” says Wright, “is to push them all together, so the lines are a bit more blurred then just saying you attended an exhibition or you went to a gig. Why can’t that happen simultaneously?

“More and more,” Wright describes,” I’m starting to enjoy the meshing of art forms in our world. I get a real issue with just going into a gallery and just seeing paintings on a wall … Don’t get me wrong, I’ve seen some beautiful exhibitions. But I like to think we can still be exposed to different art forms without actually realising that we are, but we can appreciate it in a different sense.”

As Wright elaborates, this might mean, “you walk into a park and there might be a visual artist who has created the backdrop for a group. You

know they’re involved so you’re looking for it as well, but you just appreciate it all in the context of what is Moving Music.”

With the newly expanded team, Wright says all of the “actions combined achieve something far greater than the work we could just do by ourselves in our small team”.

The list of visual artists and musicians Wright has brought on board almost reads like a who’s who in Adelaide arts at the moment, showing a beautiful balance between the young up-and-coming and the more established. Wright: “They’re just people I see out there getting it done”.

“Not necessarily in a musical sense sometimes, but someone like Ross McHenry who is part of Hurricanes with Tara Lynch: they’re just really active members in our music scene here in Adelaide, and those are the kind of bands that everyone loves. The kind that champion the idea.”

The idea of championing ideas comes through in much of what Wright talks about: in the musicians and visual artists, in a music festival that is deeply dependent on the participation and willingness of the audience to follow a mysterious path, and on everyone involved and their relationship to Adelaide.

“At the end of the day, if you’re in Melbourne, Melbourne’s got a larger critical mass of people creating projects,” he says. “For me it feels like there is probably a similar ratio of people that are going to see your event if you really want them to, and you push them to come and create excitement about that.”

In the end, Wright smiles and says, “it’s about having fun; it’s about being imaginative; it’s about being adventurous and pleasing the small hungry child in us, I guess.”

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the adelaide REVIEW january 2013

performing arts

No turning back Sarah Blasko has a quiet and unassuming way about her, Blasko’s voice reserved as she discusses her upcoming tour with Australia’s major orchestras in a manner which belies the success befallen her since her journey began with the first of four solo albums almost 10 years ago.

laughs: “It won’t necessarily have to compare, if this is what you are getting at. It will indeed need to be very different overall, but I am not worrying about whether I need to wait until some long term milestone to put out such a record as this; perhaps my next album will be toned back in such an extent that I play everything on the record! I may just go into complete hermit mode and sit inside until it is done. I have travelled a lot in the last few years so maybe hiding out would do me some good for my writing.”

She laughs, as we both realise that while being a multi instrumentalist playing piano, guitar and singing, a solo Blasko would be unlikely to replicate the enormous sound of a 52-piece orchestra. Having Wales working with her “was a blessing, I was really very lucky” she comments, with gratitude etched in her voice.

“He is a talented arranger and was really in tune with exactly the kind of sound I wanted to achieve with this album and where I wanted it to go. Putting together such a large project as this really means you need to be working with the right people who have a glimpse of the overall result measuring up to what the composer or artist is hoping for; I really feel I was blessed to have that in my friend and colleague - a support in a musical sense as well as others, especially with this project!”

Blasko will perform in Adelaide with the ASO and will perform with five other orchestras across the country in February.

“To be honest with you, I feel like I am jumping off a cliff! I have never performed with an orchestra before but it is the most amazing wall of sound doing something like this. Very powerful and emotional. A great number of people are unaware that in Bulgaria the film industry commonly employs this particular orchestra working in similar projects, as they are often utilised for film scores over there. For both performance and composition in fact!”

The future beyond this tour, which sees her travelling to most Australian states before heading overseas to Europe and beyond is simply to keep forging ahead. Blasko has ideas aplenty, and is grateful at the opportunities already offered her.

“I guess what an artist is always doing is searching for that next big thing. So whilst I am about to start this tour, I am already thinking about what I may be doing in the months to follow. It is ever changing.

Sarah Blasko

“I have some work upcoming with the Sydney Dance Company, which will be exciting. Sydney is a solid place to be, to call home for a time at

Sian Williams

showcasing her beautiful lyrical and musical

least. Having spent much of the last year or so

W

message. Regarding her work with Wales she

travelling it will be nice to sit back and enjoy a

orking with a variety of

notes; “His input complements my own writing

little rest and potter in some new ideas.”

ensembles and artistic

and as such I was thrilled for him to undertake

partnerships, Blasko has

all the arrangements and orchestration for the

woven a trail of musical

record, which I have to say, has been a massive

diversity including working with her sister

effort! The album was largely recorded in

Sarah Blasko & the Adelaide Symphony

Kate, also a singer, and various collaborations

Stockholm and Bucharest after spending a good

Orchestra

including a duo and her current line up which

deal of time in Britain hiding out and writing.

Friday, February 1

can usually be relied upon as being a five to

It has been a long journey.”

Festival Theatre

six piece band. Or perhaps, of late, with an

Blasko spent seven months residing in

orchestra. Friend Nicholas Wales has been

Stockholm during which time her fourth album

largely responsible for arrangements on

was recorded utilising the Bulgarian Symphony

her fourth and most recent album, I Awake,

Orchestra. Upon being questioned as to where

featuring the Bulgarian Symphony Orchestra

one would go next after this current album, she

sarahblasko.com

the adelaide REVIEW january 2013

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performing arts

Don’t look back DocWeek debuts in 2013 as a public program of documentaries that will run in conjunction with the Australian International Documentary Conference (AIDC). DocWeek has scored a major coup for its inaugural festival, as its highlight guest is DA Pennebaker who jets to Adelaide with collaborator and wife, Chris Hegedus.

David Knight

P

ennebaker and Hegedus’ films will be shown throughout the festival with an evening of conversation with the filmmakers that will be followed by a screening of their tour movie with a difference, Depeche Mode 101. Pennebaker and Hegedus have been involved with doco standards such as Primary, The War Room, Don’t Look Back and Startup.

com. DocWeek Director Joost den Hartog said Pennebaker was his number one choice to be the inaugural guest as the Don’t Look Back director and his peers Albert Maysles and Richard Leacock pioneered documentary filmmaking in the 60s.

“They defined that observational documentary genre that became so famous,” den Hartog explains.

“These guys really pioneered it and they’ve been the fly on the wall of American culture for decades.

It’s amazing the way they manage to get access and capture the moments and piece it together in the story. It’s just what they capture. There are no tricks. No narration. Hardly any music used. It’s the raw footage put together in a way that a narrative emerges, it’s amazing stuff.”

Den Hartog said he had always wanted to nab Pennebaker for the AIDC since his contemporaries Leacock and Maysles were previous guests of the industry conference, AIDC. “They’re all friends and they collaborated on Primary, a landmark film which we will show in the program. But Pennebaker never came out.

He was the number one choice. He was instantly enthusiastic and confirmed his attendance. Then three weeks after we had done the deal it was announced that he would win the honourary Oscar, as the first documentary filmmaker to ever win that prize. I couldn’t believe my ears.”

Aside from Pennebaker and Hegedus, DocWeek features guests such as Austrian director Nikolaus Geyrhalter (“He tells these quite socially engaged stories but only with images,” den Hartog explains. “There is no narration, not even dialogue in his films. They are visually spectacular.”) and Cnex founder Ben Tsiag.

Chris Hegedus and DA Pennebaker

“He was the co-founder of Cnex, which is the biggest internet provider in China. Then he had a heart attack and wanted to do something else and started this company that is committed to producing and financing 10 documentaries a year on a certain topic for 10 years. We’re showing four films, highlights from their collection. He’s an amazing guy.

He’s coming over and he’s going to do a masterclass as part of our summer school program.”

DocWeek will not be a showcase of the latest documentary films that will be in contention for a prize.

“We’ve been very careful with positioning this festival in a way that its complementary to the festivals that are already around. It would be really foolish for us to try and compete with the Adelaide Film Festival or with any film festival in Australia. I strongly believe that film festivals are there to provide a platform for filmmakers. It’s a very delicate infrastructure and as soon as festivals

Bob Dylan and DA Pennebaker

try and compete with each other, the group that misses out is the filmmakers; we’re really trying to avoid that competition. So, that’s the reason we are not picking the best films of the moment. In Adelaide that’s the role of the Adelaide Film Festival.

We’re celebrating documentary as a genre and we picked a few filmmakers and we show a body of work reflecting that. It’s very much a retrospective festival, except for our competition strand of four films by first time filmmakers after graduation [F4: First Factual Films]. The purpose of that strand is to showcase the best of emerging talent in Australia and to help filmmakers bridge the gap between their first and second films.”

DocWeek Monday, February 25 to Sunday, March 3 program.docweek.org.au

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the adelaide REVIEW january 2013

performing arts

The adventures of Pi Christopher Sanders

O

scar winning director Ang Lee’s adaptation of the ‘unfilmable’ Booker Prize winning novel Life of Pi is a visual spectacle, which takes CGI and 3D to new emotional heights but at the heart of the film is the performance by novice actor Suraj Sharma as Pi. Sharma beat out 3000 hopefuls to land the role of Pi, a spiritually curious teenager whose family owns a zoo in Pondicherry, a former French colony in India. His family move to Canada and sets sail on a cargo ship with the zoo’s animals, which will be sold on arrival. The ship sinks and Pi is the only human survivor. He thankfully finds a lifeboat but his companion for the perilous journey is a Bengal tiger called Richard Parker. Sharma, who now studies philosophy at university, had to go through some exhausting method acting tactics to play Pi. Losing 20 percent of his bodyweight to match Pi’s 227 days at sea, Sharma meditated and Ang Lee made the crew keep their distance from Sharma to enhance Pi’s sense of isolation. Pi’s story, which an older Pi in the film and book recounts to a visiting writer, is one that will “make you believe in God”. An awakening occurred to

Wagner

18 1 3 W a g ner & V erdi

Peter B assett

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Sharma during filming.

“We were coming to the last scenes on the ocean, so I was extremely tired and extremely thin and always kind of hungry,” Sharma explains. “I was meditating a lot; we were doing this for so long that we got to the point where we were sort of bottoming out. I hit something at that point. I don’t know how to explain it, a little bit crazy I guess. Not crazy in the normal sense though it was just very, you know, the ocean is unnaturally calm, kind of like that.”

Did Sharma use that for his performance?

“Yeah, I totally did. It’s my understanding now of what spirituality is. I didn’t understand what it was at first and I still can’t define it or explain it but I think I was vaguely close at that point.”

This mirrors Pi’s journey. Pi was raised a Hindi but converts to Christianity and Islam and practices all three forms of religion before his journey with Richard Parker, a creature he must

Wagn1813

er & Ve rdi

Verdi Peter B assett

This beautiful book has been published to celebrate the bicentenary of the births of Richard Wagner and Giuseppe Verdi. Peter Bassett’s new study is richly illustrated in full colour with artworks drawn from opera houses, museums and private collections. 232 pages in large format. RRP $88. Postage free in Australia.

Order online at:

www.peterbassett.com.au

is the only thing that’s really driving me.”

Is that because of Ang Lee? “Ang, the entire journey, the crew, seeing what they were put through and seeing how you survived. We made something that was very beautiful. It’s very inspiring and something I can’t really let go of. It’s something I will really cherish for probably the rest of my life. The entire thing just means so much to me that it’s all I want to do. It was hard and intense as hell but I will probably want to relive the entire thing.”

Life of Pi opens on Tuesday, January 1

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Everything you always wanted to know about Sophie Lellouche (but were afraid to ask) D.M. Bradley

Wagner &Verdi

respect, help and fear while stranded at sea. To make things trickier for Sharma, Richard Parker was a CGI character, even though the film used real tigers to base their spectacular creation on.

“Once when they [the tigers] were being trained I was standing with two of my friends from the crew and at one point someone said something louder than usual and one of the tigers just looked right at him in the eyes and at that moment you start to realise that they hurt. It came by accident but you gained so much because you get this sudden sense of chill and were just frozen at that point. You try reliving stuff like that in your head many times over and you just get there.”

Sharma may pursue a career in film but behind the camera instead of in front of it.

“I do feel very strongly that I want to be associated in film work and filmmaking. I don’t get that kind of feeling anywhere else, so it really

“

Yes, I am a very big Woody Allen fan”, begins Paris-Manhattan writer/director Sophie Lellouche, “and my film [her feature début] was inspired by Play It Again, Sam. In that film Bogart is the advisor for Woody, and I remember thinking, at the time, that it would be nice to have Woody Allen as my friend and advisor. And it planted this idea in my head, so when I wrote the script it was about this woman who has trouble becoming an adult, and she finds herself thanks to Woody.” Or, actually, thanks to a poster on her wall that dispenses romantic advice in dialogue grabs borrowed from no less than seven Allen classics.

In order to attain the rights to use both Woody’s voice and image Lellouche had to seek personal permission from him and the

studios as well, but she says that she always thought it would work out as, “I’m a dreamer.

I felt that I was very close to Woody Allen and hoped that he would be a nice person, and so I went to New York to meet him… I told him that I had this script and he said to send it to him, so I did, and he agreed to be involved. It was very fast and yes, he was so nice, and so genuine, as I was a first-time filmmaker and he just trusted me. He was marvellous.”

Sophie also states that the casting of her film was crucial, and that the right actors had to be found to play Alice and Victor, but it all happened quite easily: “I wanted Alice Taglioni to play Alice, so we called her agent and she read the script and I think that it really excited her… And Patrick Bruel is a big singing star in France, maybe the most popular singer there,

and he has been for 20 years, and he was happy to do the role. In some ways he was the star of the movie, although Alice is the main character, and it’s her story.”

And, in the wake of the success of ParisManhattan, Sophie wants to try several projects, one of which is autobiographical, as “every movie that I make is going to be autobiographical, I think. I also want every movie that I make to be important to me, to be about a level of me and my life, and to change my life. I hope it will.”

the adelaide REVIEW january 2013

performing arts

LES MISÉRABLES (M) D.M. Bradley Victor Hugo’s 1862 novel has been filmed endlessly, but this is the first shot at capturing its immensely popular musical reincarnation, complete with a star cast crooning and direction

by Tom Hooper (of The King’s Speech) that sometimes suffocates beneath its grandiosity.

Still, there are splendidly show-stopping moments as Jean Valjean (Hugh Jackman), introduced in a Hellish prison and performing Look Down, is granted parole after 19 years, but remains forever pursued by ruthless lawman Javert (Russell Crowe, the one here who suffers most from Hooper’s decision to record the singing – and speakingsinging dialogue – pretty much entirely live). Years later, the secretly-fugitive Valjean is reborn under an assumed name as the mayor of Montreuil-sur-Mer, and yet his soft heart means that his cover’s soon blown, and then he’s on the run again and looking for Cosette, daughter of Fantine (Anne Hathaway), a

The Hobbit: An Unexpected Journey (PG) Christopher Sanders Peter Jackson’s long awaited prequel to his successful The Lord of the Rings trilogy has been hit with conflicts since day dot including a change of director, as Guillermo del Toro had enough of the delays to make way for Jackson to once again oversee his Middle Earth vision.

With the much smaller source material of J.R.R. Tolkien’s The Hobbit being stretched to three films despite having about 1200 less pages than The Lord of the Rings (which was a film and novel trilogy) and mixed early reviews, there were concerns that Jackson had faltered, done a George Lucas and forever tainted his greatest epic with a cash grab trilogy. But the first installment of The Hobbit is one again a success for Jackson and his team. Yes there is padding, yes the battle and chase scenes are overlong and yes the jokes are silly and the

woman fired from his factory and for whom he feels responsible (and who wouldn’t after Hathaway’s perfectly tear-jerking, single-take shot at I Dreamed a Dream?). And then, in the third timeframe, the grown-up Cosette (Amanda Seyfried), long in Valjean’s care, falls for Marius (Eddie Redmayne) in some soppy scenes, and the intrigue and glowering drama return when the indefatigable Javert arrives again and all become part of the 1832 Paris student uprisings, with Valjean, once more, risking his life to save others (and, as he’s played by Hugh Jackman, we believe he would too).

Guaranteed to please the stage show’s fan legion, Hooper’s Les Mis features fine work from Jackman and Hathaway, pleasantly sappy warbling by Seyfried and Redmayne, gorgeously funny comedy from the outrageous Helena Bonham Carter and Sacha Baron Cohen (having great fun with Master Of The House) and a dedicated if awkward turn

by Crowe. But do give the guy a break as, strictly speaking, Javert’s an impossible character to play, as he’s such an unforgiving bastard, and truly the misérable one here.

resolutions simple (The Hobbit was a children’s book after all) but Jackson has masterly deposited The Hobbit in his Lord of the Rings universe, remember Tolkien released The Hobbit 17 years before the Lord of the Rings and it was a much smaller and simpler world. A humble story about a Hobbit (Bilbo Baggins, wonderfully portrayed

by Martin Freeman) going on an adventure with a gang of Dwarves (thanks to an intervention

by Gandalf, Ian McKellen) to reclaim their rock castle from a dragon (Smaug), Jackson has added sections from Tolkien’s other Middle Earth texts to beef up the story.

The Hobbit isn’t a cynical attempt at a cash grab – if anything Jackson is overcommitted to his pet cause (at least 30 minutes could have been cut from this 170 minute film) – and is a worthy prequel. Plus The Hobbit contains that scene: Bilbo and Gollum’s fateful meeting where Bilbo escapes with the ring after a game of riddles where the CGI created Gollum (Andy Serkis) is once again the star of the scene and the film.

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the adelaide REVIEW january 2013

visual arts

Float my boat

Antony Hamilton, 1999, Tibooburra

John Neylon

W

hen it comes to boats, and wooden ones at that, most artists wouldn’t know a free spinning sheave from a rope strop block. Rightly so. Artists are artists, creative, imaginative free spirits and all that.

Boat builders are, well, hewers of wood and dividers of water. The only congruence of the two worlds is ships in bottles. Turner Prize-winning artist Yinka Shonibare, sited his Nelson’s Ship in a Bottle on the ‘Fourth Plinth’ in London’s Trafalgar Square earlier last year. The ship was a 1:30 scaled down version of Nelson’s ship Victory. London Mayor Boris Johnson commented that the work hinted at the real reason Nelson defeated a much larger Franco-Spanish fleet. ‘He had lots of bottle.’ Nearby in the National Gallery, Skyfall’s James Bond was sitting, contemplating J.M.W. Turner’s The Fighting Temeraire (1839). Its subject is the old gunship HMS Temeraire, one of the second-rate ships of the line, which played a key role at the Battle of Trafalgar, being towed to the scrap heap.

007 had his personal reasons for meditating on obsolescence. While this was taking place another ‘steam and sail’ Turner painting, Peace - Burial at Sea (1842) will have travelled from London to drop anchor at the Art Gallery of South Australia within Turner from the Tate, opening Friday, February 8.

Meanwhile back at Goolwa artists have been

Ken Orchard

messing about with artisanal types as part of something called The Wooden Boat Exchange, a partnership project between Craftsouth and Country Arts SA for Just Add Water, the Regional Centre of Culture in Goolwa in 2012.

It links traditional tradespeople associated with the boat building community around Goolwa with visual artists and craftspeople.

So a ceramic artist like Gerry Wedd gets to collaborate with wooden surfboard maker, Nick Brauer and Adelaide jeweller Juju Haifawi gets to work with Ben Smith of New Growth Surfboards. Others involved are James Edwards, Martin Corbin, the Armfield Slipway & Boatshed, the Friends of the PS Oscar W and Randall Cooper at Goolwa Masts & Welding. The outcomes will be showcased at the SA Wooden Boats Festival at Goolwa on February 23 and 24. Details are on Craftsouth’s website craftsouth.org.au. Projects like The Wooden Boat Exchange signpost a ‘mining the archive’ trend in contemporary art and design. The long-running Inside SAM’s Place collaboration between Craftsouth and the SA Museum continues to demonstrate the effectiveness of the strategy in terms of refreshing audiences’ engagement with familiar sites and collections.

As for artist and boats it is a bunched up fleet. Théodore Géricault’s The Raft of the Medusa (1818-19) continues to speak with enormous power, particularly to a contemporary audience mindful of the unfolding tragedy of refugees taking to the high seas. In Australia the best remains the Art Gallery of South Australia’s charred and water-filled, Allegory 111 (1988) by the Japanese artist Toshikatsu Endo. Greg Johns created in the mid 1990s a Run Aground series of boat hulls, rearing like wooden vessels smashing onto reefs. Antony Hamilton’s Myth and Mirage (1999), which is sited at Tibooburra NSW, is a personal favorite, an inverted, lifesized model of Charles’ Sturt’s whaleboat the explorer dragged inland in the 1840s in search of an inland sea. It’s a perfect Down-Under riposte to upright British Navy admirals with lots of bottle.

Contemporary Collectors Christmas Party The Contemporary Collectors Christmas Party was held at the Art Gallery of South Australia on Friday, November 23 Clockwise from top left: Mark Butcher, Mark Awerbuch; John Marshman, Cheryl Bridgart, Nigel Jones; Nick Mitzevich, Tracey Whiting; Jane Ayers, Tracey Whiting, Jane Messenger, Edwina Lehmann.

Photos courtesy of the Art Gallery of South Australia

Loo with a view John Neylon

J

effrey Smart hasn’t quite finished with this place. The current Carrick Hill exhibition, which throws a spotlight onto Smart’s formative Adelaide years will continue until Sunday, February 24. Into this mix comes a late but very welcome arrival – a ‘new’ work by Smart, which has not been exhibited publicly for over 60 years. It’s an exclusive to Carrick Hill for the month of January so another good reason to head for the Hill. This ‘hidden’ work has form. Titled Robe Panorama (1947) it was included in an exhibition of the

artist’s work in 1948 in John Martin’s Gallery, just prior to the artist’s departure for Europe.

Twenty works sold from this exhibition. Buyers included Louis McCubbin, Lady Bonython and Kym Bonython who secured Cape Dombey (1947). Lady Jean Bonython, who opened the exhibition, bought Robe Panorama. The work has remained in the family since that time. The painting has the Customs House (sited today on Royal Circus) to the right and some fishing craft, flagpole and a shed to the left. The image has that particular capture of clear light characteristic of Smart’s style of the period. Evident also is an awareness of relationships between the shapes contained within buildings, boats, walls and general topography. Most telling, and interesting of all is the centerpiece of the composition – a brick dunny. One commentator at the time, H.E. Fuller, said that some works in Smart’s John Martin’s Gallery exhibition were ‘sadly lacking in delicacy’, surely a reference to this strategic placement and a very good reason for the spirited Lady Bonython to buy the work.

Catchment - from source to sea

Ground Floor Gallery 23 Nov – 3 Feb 2013

gallery studio

John Lacey

“work in progress” Open most Days 11 - 5pm Ken Orchard- Grass tree sentinels

Bay Discovery Centre Glenelg Town Hall, 1 Moseley Square, Glenelg Ph: 81799508 www.holdfast.sa.gov.au

41 Woodcone Rd Mt Compass 8556 8388 www.johnlacey.com.au Just south of Mt Compass, so why not drop in when next visiting the Victor / Goolwa region

the adelaide REVIEW january 2013

visual arts

National Photographic Portrait Prize

33

exhibitions gallery shop

11 January - 3 February TWO EXHIBITIONS

Elements of Nature

Christopher Sanders

A

Jeffrey Smart, Robe Panorama, 1948

Jeffrey Smart at Carrick Hill Continues until Friday, February 24

ustralia’s finest portrait photographers are on show at the Flinders Art Museum & City Gallery, as the gallery presents the work from the National Photographic Portrait Prize (NPPP) 46 finalists, including the winning portrait of Jack Charles by Rod McNicol.

For the last five years the NPPP has been a prestigious portrait competition for both professional and amateur photographers with its $25,000 prize. Rod McNicol’s portrait of Aboriginal actor and singer Jack Charles was announced the winner in March 2012 with the competition first showing at Canberra’s National Portrait Gallery before touring the nation. Almost 1500 people entered the competition with NPPP Judge and Curator Joanna Gilmour saying that although it is hard to put in a nutshell why McNicol’s shot of Charles is special, the portrait confirms that photography can sometimes be more successful than other portrait mediums for its “sense of presence and its ability to draw you in, to make you want to know more about the sitter”.

“Rod’s photo of Jack has that element in spades.

It’s one thing to create a successful photograph, but it’s another thing altogether to create a successful photographic portrait – wherein the sitter is palpably ‘present’ or alive and not just an element of the image; and wherein it’s clear that the photographer is making very conscious decisions about how that presence might be captured. Though photographs have always been dismissed or disparaged by some critics as shallow, mechanical likenesses, I’d argue that the best photographic portraits have equal if not greater capacity for engaging a viewer.”

Gilmour says no themes were more apparent in 2012 than previous years.

“The 2012 NPPP reaffirmed that it’s a project that reflects the range and inventiveness of photographic portraiture in Australia. For the five years that it’s been running, it has always attracted a diverse range of entries from photographers who are taking different approaches to portraiture.”

Two South Australian artists are part of the 46 finalists and have portraits showing at Flinders: Benjamin Liew and Alex Frayne.

contemporary paintings by Lisa Dalla Rosa Meet the Artist 2pm Sunday 20 January

Mixed Messages artwork created using mixed media by members of the Red House Group Inc

Roderick D. McNicol, Jack Charles, digital print (detail)

“Both photos are very accomplished in regards to technique, composition and so forth; and are very successful also in terms of that quality I was talking about in relation to the winning portrait – that ability to draw you in and make you want to know more about the sitters. Both photos also really capture something of the sitters’ personalities or spirits.

“Alex Frayne’s photo – a portrait of a 70-yearold man named Trevor Murphy, photographed on the jetty at Glenelg – is one of my favourites in the exhibition and also has a great story attached to it.

Alex’s statement about the work explains that Trevor has spent ‘endless days’ jumping from the jetty over the years and that he continues to do so despite his age. The portrait conveys a palpable sense of Trevor’s character and you get a strong feeling that the sitter considers himself ‘one of the boys’ despite the age difference between him and his fellow jetty-jumpers; it suggests something also of how addictive and exhilarating a pastime it must be – how it keeps him feeling young, as Alex has explained in the caption.”

(above) Lynette Brown (right) Bev Bills

Gallery M, Marion Cultural Centre 287 Diagonal Rd, Oaklands Pk SA P:8377 2904 info@gallerym.net.au

www.gallerym.net.au

10 X TEN

T’Arts 10th Birthday Celebration A decade of collective and collaborative work

18 January – 8 February

National Photographic Portrait Prize 2012 Flinders Art Museum & City Gallery Continues until Sunday, February 17 flinders.edu.au/artmuseum/exhibitions Opens: Friday 18 January at 6pm Opening Speaker: Ewart Shaw Arts Producer, Radio Adelaide

Retrospective

MCLAREN VALE VISITOR CENTRE

1st Feb – 17th March 2012 Stunning retrospective to honor the wood work of ROBIN TURNER with painitngs by Dridan, Danvers, Davis, Dallwitz, Hannaford, Leslie, Pearse, Prest, Redgate & Wilson

Phone: 8323 9944

Beside the sea (detail), photo by David Simpson

Port Adelaide Sailing Club (detail), Oil by Stefan Zarebski

ROBIN TURNER

ROYAL SOUTH AUSTRALIAN SOCIETY OF ARTS INC. La Petite et Le Grande RSASA Members’ Summer Exhibition

T’Arts Artist Demonstration Saturday 19 January 2pm – 4pm Liz Wauchope – Silk Painting Kathryn Hill – ‘Encaustic’ (Painting with Bees Wax)

Free entry - all welcome!

14 December – 23 December 2 January – 25 January 2013 Big & small artworks, painting, photographs, mixed media, textiles, printmaking, sculpture.

Artworks over a metre wide and under 20cm x 20cm (big & little).

Art Mart 16 December – 23 December Members unframed artworks under $200 – Cash & Carry.

Gallery closed 24 December – opens 2 January.

Royal South Australian Society of Arts Inc. Level 1 Institute Building, Cnr North Terrace & Kintore Ave Adelaide, Ph/Fax: 8232 0450 www.rsasarts.com.au rsasarts@bigpond.net.au Mon- Fri 10.30-4.30pm Sat & Sun 1- 4pm Pub Hol. Closed.

Pepper Street Arts Centre Exhibitions. Gift Shop. Art Classes. Coffee Shop.

558 Magill Road, Magill PH: 8364 6154 Hours: Tuesday to Saturday 12 noon - 5 pm An arts & cultural initiative funded by the City of Burnside

www.pepperstreetartscentre.com.au

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the adelaide REVIEW january 2013

visual arts

Only change is constant

This month The Adelaide Review’s guide to January’s highlight visual arts exhibitions Generate

Takahiro Iwasaki, Reflection Model (Perfect Bliss) 2010–12, Installation view, photograph: Keizo Kioku, image courtesy: The artist and ARATANIURANO, Tokyo

JamFactory, GalleryOne Continues until Friday, January 25 jamfactory.com.au

JamFactory’s Generate is annual exhibition of Emma Klau

work by the emerging artists and designers who have just completed JamFactory’s two-year Associate training program. This exhibition represents the culmination of the Associates’ time in the studio, producing work across the jewellery, ceramics, furniture and glass spectrums.

Freedom by Sarah Bamford

GHOTI 15 The Light Gallery Continues until Friday, January 25 ccp.sa.edu.au

The Centre for Creative Photography’s (CCP) biannual exhibition Ghoti 15 is currently showing at Marleston’s Light Gallery. The exhibition showcases the best work of current CCP students.

COLLEC+ORS Art Gallery of South Australia, Gallery 11 Serving Table by Gwyn Hanssen Pigott

Continues until Sunday, June 30 artgallery.sa.gov.au

Created by designer Khai Liew in conjunction with eminent Australian artists, the Collec+ors suite of furniture debuted in 2010 for SALA. The suite was selected as the only Australian finalist in the international Designs of the Year awards held at the London Design Museum in 2011. A selection of works by the Collec+ors artists will also be shown in an adjacent gallery.

Mark Richards, 2012, digital photograph, 60 x 40cm

Mark Richards with Wayne Smith and Paul Johnson The Four Seasons Murray Bridge Regional Gallery Continues until Sunday, February 3 murraybridgegallery.com.au

Mark Richards’ distinctive High Dynamic Range photographic technique captures the subtle beauty of a seasonal landscape.

ART SCHOOL & GALLERY P R O F E S S I O N A L I S M AT L E I S U R E

2013 Term 1 commences

30 January For full programme contact Peter Bok

8346 2600 bapea@aapt.net.au

51 Wood Avenue Brompton SA 5007 T - 08 8346 2600 E - bapea@aapt.net.au http://people.aapt.net.au/~bapea

Affordable Quality 9 Week Terms Beginners & Advanced Drawing

$235

Life Drawing

$280

Portrait Drawing

$280

Painting the Figure & Portraiture

$310

Beginner’s Painting

$265

General Painting

$265

Watercolours & Pen & Ink

$235

Stephanie Radok

I

walked to the Gallery of Modern Art and the Queensland Gallery of Art on the Kurilpa Bridge over the Brisbane River. The first thing I saw as I approached the three elements of New Zealander Michael Parekowhai’s sculpture called The World Turns was a large Eastern Water Dragon who emerged onto the grass at the same time as I did. I stopped and we studied each other, eventually I quietly walked on though the lizard did not move. It seemed auspicious to be acknowledged by a local lizard before entering a huge field of art from all over the world brought together in Australia. Later I saw more Dragons on the lawns and tree near the QAG café, nature meeting culture with cool green-yellow eyes.

The World Turns, which has enraged both some local Aboriginal people and the Queensland government (for different reasons), was commissioned to commemorate the 20th anniversary of the beginning of the Asia Pacific Triennial and the sixth anniversary of the Gallery of Modern Art. It contains three bronze elements, a life-size elephant like a giant bookend tipped on its head and a kuril or native water rat in the process of grooming itself. Then a way off but

facing the pair is a bronze chair, a place to sit and contemplate the upended symbol of imperial power, the elephant, and a confident creature of powerful local knowledge, the rat.

This is the seventh iteration of the huge and extraordinary Asia Pacific Triennials (APTs) that began in 1993 at the Queensland Gallery of Art and now also envelops the Gallery of Modern Art built nearby in 2006. When the APTs began 20 years ago there was something really fresh and experimental about looking to our near neighbours to the north, the west, the east and the south for manifestations of contemporary art. There is still a sense of freshness and the unexpected in the exhibition, of great abundance and complexity, joined to the presence of increasing connections and communications between all parts of the world. In the words of New Zealand art historian and APT catalogue essayist Peter Brunt: “Art today is not a fixed and predetermined Western concept but is open for reflection and renegotiation in the convergence of many ‘art histories’.”

APT7 features works by 75 artists and groups from 27 countries from India to Samoa, Indonesia to Japan, and includes global diasporas, and Australia too. For the first time West Asia is in the mix so sometimes it seems that the APT has stretched the

the adelaide REVIEW january 2013

35

visual arts category of Asia Pacific to include the world.

A central motif of the show was ephemeral structures. The biggest works on show were from the East Sepik Province in Papua New Guinea and consisted of the front section and the ceiling of a spirit house made in Brisbane respectively by Abelam and Kwoma men. A large display of performance masks, and other objects also filled the huge Long Gallery at GoMA. The preponderance of the colour black in the hypnotic paintings of faces, lizards and repetitive designs seemed to hold an illimitable darkness like the mysterious unfathomable space between stars. Japanese artist Takahiro Iwasaki’s wooden Reflection Model (Perfect Bliss) hung in the centre of gallery like a reflection in a lake, a floating evanescent moment of stillness.

Sometimes the exhibition felt like a geography lesson. This near anthropological turn in contemporary art can place the viewer in the position of a student, an idea explored in a lecture at the opening by New York-based art historian Claire Bishop who harked back to the Free International University of Joseph Beuys. The Romantic Punk Shamanism movement mentioned by Kazahkstan artist Almagul Menlibayeva also raises the still fertile ghost of Beuys.

And finding out about the lives of others formed a significant and poignant part of the content of the exhibition. Thai artist Pratchaya Phintong did a residency in Sweden and at the airport in Stockholm met hundreds of Thai rice farmers who seasonally pick berries in Lapland. Apparently the action of harvesting rice is similar to the action of harvesting berries. For me it was the simple fact of what he drew attention to, Thai rural workers in Lapland, that was most extraordinary. What could be more distant than Thailand and Lapland?

Indian artist LN Tallur’s work Unicode, a very roughly made ball of cement studded with silver coins and covered in pungent linseed oil sat, instead of a Shiva dancing figure, inside a bronze ring of flames. The work embodied a comment on the weighty role of capitalism in creating and destroying worlds. The first APT was subtitled ‘Tradition and Change’, the seventh APT is still about these issues though almost nothing has stayed the same.

Asia Pacific Triennial 7 (APT7) Queensland Gallery of Art and Gallery of Modern Art, Brisbane Continues until Sunday, April 14 qagoma.qld.gov.au

ADELAIDES LARGEST RANGE OF QUALITY ART MATERIALS

Lost, oil on linen, 60cm x 85cm, 2010-11, photo: MJ Richardson

Profile: Mary-Jean Richardson Jane Llewellyn

I

t’s all about painting for Mary-Jean Richardson who was recently named the recipient of the inaugural threemonth AEAF Cibo Espresso Studio Residency at the British School in Rome.

“My practice has essentially always been painting. I am very interested in the act of painting, being a painter, paintings old and new.”

Richardson graduated from the Adelaide Central School of Art (ACSA) in 2000 after entering as a mature age student.

“It was something I never thought I would do. I went to art school part time to do a little bit of drawing. I always liked art and I had always done creative things.” Initially after finishing art school Richardson’s career was on a roll with exhibitions across the country.

“I could have stayed on this path showing in commercial galleries but in 2008 I decided to do my masters. That opened up another world to me. I realised I love study.”

While her paintings appear to catch a moment in time they are actually well thought out compositions. The idea comes quickly but then how that idea evolves into a painting is a much longer process. It can often take her up to 80 photographs to get the perfect image.

“When I think of an idea it’s a drawing, then I’ll photograph and photograph and photograph to get that right mood. I’m a terrible photographer which works well because I am never looking at it as a photograph, I’m always thinking about how it will work as a painting.”

Her practice focuses on how figurative and abstraction work together and paint is the perfect medium for this. “Paint is this beautiful wet mucky thing, it lends itself to so many ways of working with it.”

Currently Richardson is on the management team at Fontanelle where she occupies one of the studio spaces and she is a part-time lecturer at the ACSA. She is looking forward to her three-month stint in Rome, which starts in July and being able to really focus on her work. What better place for a painter to immerse themselves than Rome, home to some of the greatest artists and artworks of all time. For Richardson, “It was just at the right time to think about histories and where painting sits in contemporary practice”.

This exploration into the history of painting and how her work fits into this means the residency is a great fit for her. “Being a painter we have this huge weight of history behind us. We wear the history of painting as we are making paintings, we are thinking about painting in the future. So somewhere like Rome that negotiates contemporary work and ancient work is perfect.”

While in Rome Richardson plans to look at as much work as she can, particularly focusing on the Baroque and artists like Caravaggio.

“Light and dark is very important to me. As is the criss-crossing of contemporary techniques and ancient techniques.”

What the outcome of her investigations will be she is unsure about and wants to keep an open mind and go wherever Rome takes her.

17TH PROSPECT COMMUNITY SHOW 2 January to 20 January 2012

Image: Gai Dudley, Ina Mahler-Ramsay, Lidwien Holzbauer, Joanna Majchrowska, Coralie Joy Sandow, photography by John Nieddu

1 Thomas Street (cnr Main North Road) Nailsworth Tel 8342 8175 prospect.sa.gov.au

T’Arts Collective Gays Arcade (off Adelaide Arcade)

Exciting artist run contemporary gallery / shop in the heart of Adelaide.

Sea Urchins by Jenny Knight

GHOTI 15 - Student Exhibition 14 Dec 2012 - 25 Jan 2013

83 Commercial Road, Port Adelaide Open: Mon - Fri 8.30-5pm Sat 9-2pm Phone: 8241 0059 sales@portartsupplies.com.au

Open Mon-Sat 10am-5pm Phone 8232 0265

www.tartscollective.com.au

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the adelaide REVIEW january 2013

books

Summer Reading F

rom classics to modern Australian novels, hard-boiled war stories and political essays, the range of books enjoyed during 2012 was eclectic, stunning and intriguing. The Adelaide Review asked some prominent Adelaideans, local writers and our reviewers to list some of their favourite

reads of 2012 while also listing three books they will look forward to getting stuck into over the summer months. While some inclusions won’t surprise, there were some unexpected results as evidenced by the double appearance of the 1987 classic The Fatal Shore, by the late Robert Hughes.

Summer reading • A.M. Homes, May we be Forgiven (Granta) • Jared Diamond, World Until Yesterday (Penguin) • Alice Munro, Dear Life (Chatto & Windus)

Best of 2012 1. David Byrne, How Music Works (Canongate) 2. Josephine Rowe, Tarcutta Wake (UQP) 3. Jaron Lanier, You Are Not a Gadget: A Manifesto (Knopf) Summer reading • Jeff Sparrow, Money Shot: A Journey Into Porn and Censorship (Scribe) • James Gleick, Information: A History, a Theory, a Flood (Harper Collins) • Ramona Koval, By the Book: A Reader’s Guide to Life (Text)

Laura Kroetsch Director, Adelaide Writers’ Week

Jason Lake Director, Imprints Booksellers Best of 2012 1. Lance Weller, Wilderness (Bloomsbury) 2. Kevin Powers, Yellow Birds (Hachette) 3. Neil Young, Waging Heavy Peace (Viking)

David Sornig Writer

Best of 2012 1. A M Homes, May we be Forgiven (Granta) 2. Christopher Koch, Lost Voices (HarperCollins) 3. Kevin Powers, The Yellow Birds (Hachette) Summer reading • Parker Bilal, Dogstar Rising (Bloomsbury) • Chika Uniqwe, Night Dancer (Random) • Nicolas Rothwell, Belomor (Text)

Nick Mitzevich Director, Art Gallery of South Australia Best of 2012 1. Robert Hughes, The Fatal Shore (Random House) 2. Ian Warrell, J.M.W Turner (Tate Publishing) 3. Heidi Gildemeister, Gardening the Mediterranean Way (Thames & Hudson) Summer reading • Victoria Finlay, A Natural History of the Palette (Random House) • Edmund De Waal, The Hare with Amber Eyes: A Hidden Inheritance (Farrar, Straus and Giroux) • Tracey Lock-Weir, Anna Platten (Art Gallery of South Australia) David Sefton Artistic Director, Adelaide Festival Best of 2012 1. Kevin Powers, The Yellow Birds (Hachette) 2. Michel Houllebecq, The Map and the Territory (Random House) 3. Sven Lindqvist, Exterminate All the Brutes (Granta)

For those days when it’s a scorching 42 degrees outside, you need a good book to take your mind off your poor garden and how you look in nothing but a singlet and thongs. We have everything from cooking to carpentry to computers to cops and robbers. Book now to escape the heat!

Dymocks Adelaide

Summer reading • Haruki Murakami, IQ84 (Random House) • China Mieville, Railsea (Macmillan) • Robert Hughes, The Fatal Shore (Random House) Roger Hainsworth Reviewer

Best of 2012 1. Ali Smith, There but for the (Penguin) 2. M. Barnard Eldershaw, Tomorrow and Tomorrow and Tomorrow (Virago Modern Classics) 3. Andrei Codrescu, The Posthuman Dada Guide: Tzara and Lenin Play Chess (Princeton University Press) Summer reading • Denis Johnson, Train Dreams (Granta) • Zadie Smith, NW (Penguin) • Phillip Pullman, Grimm Tales (Penguin)

Stephen Orr Writer Best of 2012 1. Romy Ash, Floundering (Text) 2. Carrie Tiffany, Mateship with Birds (Picador) 3. Thomas Wolfe, Of Time and the River (Penguin) Summer reading • Steven Schwartz, Little Raw Souls (Autumn House Press) • J.M. Coetzee, The Childhood of Jesus (Text) • Jared Diamond, The World Until Yesterday: What Can We Learn From Traditional Societies? (Penguin)

Suzanne Miller Director, South Australian Museum Best of 2012 1. Peter Fitzsimons, Mawson (Random House) 2. J.K. Rowling, (Hachette) 3. Joanne Harris, Peaches for Monsieur Le Cure (Random House) Summer reading • Kate Morton, The Secret Keeper (Centre Point) • Robert Macklin, One False Move (Hachette) • Alexander McCall Smith, The Uncommon Appeal of Clouds (Random House)

Mandy Macky Dymocks Adelaide

Dead Yet (Macmillan)

Best of 2012 1. Monica McInerney, House of Memories (Penguin) 2. Robin Sloan, Mr Penumbra’s 24 Hour Book Store (Penguin) 3. Gillian Flynn, Gone Girl (Hachette)

Summer reading • Jo Nesbo, The Bat (Harvill Secker) • Michael Connelly, The Black Box (Allen & Unwin) • Ian Rankin, Standing in Another Man’s Grave (Orion)

Summer reading • Rachel Joyce, The Unlikely Pilgrimage of Harold Fry (Random House) • Kate Atkinson, Life After Life (due March 2013) (Random House) • Tom Holland, A History Book (Hachette)

Best of 2012 1. Sheila Hale, Titian (Harper Press) 2. Jo Nesbo, Phantom (Harvill Secker) 3. Peter James, Not

08 8223 5380

Written & designed by Peter Gale Graphic Design 08 8362 6849

Helen Dinmore Writer

the adelaide REVIEW january 2013

37

food, wine & coffee

Review: The Mac Factory John McGrath Photo: Tony Lewis

Review: The Curious Squire John McGrath

T

he Curious Squire has gone off from Day One. We went on the first Saturday night. Come nine o’clock: boom.

Rollicking. No yobs. Fun for peeps used to silently twittering and texting. To make up for it everyone yells at each other and looks happy.

Curious is part of a top-end beer driven chain.

James Squire if you haven’t guessed. There are a few Squires scattered around Australia. There are many beers on tap. There are beertails. Adelaide’s menu is its own. Chef Praveen Pall’s menu to be exact. Praveen also looks after D’Artagnan, a couple of doors down O’Connell Street. Both places are everything the other one isn’t, if that makes sense.

After being re-assured by General Manager Michael Murphy that the butter chicken was not toxic, was the Chef’s family recipe, wouldn’t be slimy like every other butter chicken in the world, I ate it. Glory be. Sharp and tangy. No slime.

You will recognise Michael when you see him. He is one of the few professionals at his trade in Adelaide.

A pleasure to watch. He is everywhere and nowhere.

The menu is large and set out like an American

menu. Tricksy names in America un-nerve me.

If they have to market it you shouldn’t eat it, is a good rule when eating State-Side. Baby.

So I ordered Nine Tales Con Carne ($14) with trepidation. Why did I worry? This isn’t the US yet, er, baby. A version of chilli con carne appeared.

Fabulous. The boring sounding ‘zucchini fritters’ ($9.50). Fabulous. They were served hot in a frying basket. Hot is the time to eat them up.

We ordered a sandwich called ‘The Club’ ($15.50) expecting a club sandwich so I could pretend to be in luxury hotel with Lana del Rey getting ready to strip the mini-bar then fall exhausted etc… A vision I didn’t share with Duck Woman. It would have led to an attack of the sulks. Even though she talks of naught but George Clooney.

What has happened to club sandwiches?

Maybe it’s a long time between luxury hotels.

The decoration goes wow. The ceiling, which has looked down on a couple of highly priced stinkers, looks like charred wood. Sigh. What tricks polystyrene can play. Wrong again. The dramatic ceiling “is really” charred wood. It forces the hub-bub straight down. Eerily, on the footpath, a metre from the din – silence.

Y

ou may have been posting a letter (how quaint) at the Hutt Street Post Office or you were wandering aimlessly, overcome by the elegance of dwellers of the Parisian South East corner of Adelaide.

The Force tells you: “Look up, Luke.”

You see a sign: The Mac Factory.

Up the stairs you go. “Mac?” you ponder.

No, it isn’t the global HQ of a company selling fodder to the masses, nor is it a core of a computer styling company. A cross between Andy Warhol’s Factory and Willy Wonka’s Chocolate Factory is close.

A manifesto is framed and hung.

You are in the heart of the macaroon trade. Boxes of macaroons. Towers of macaroons.

For weddings, doe shows, birthdays, for no reason at all. Prices range from $2.50 each to $30 for 57. Or a multi-coloured feast with a well made coffee at The Mac Factory.

Minus the jumping up and down about the genius of the barista who meditates for an hour before fingering a single bean.

The Curious Squire 10 O’Connell Street, North Adelaide Hours: Monday – Thursday: Midday – Midnight Friday: Midday – 2am Saturday: 9am – 2am Sunday: 9am – Midnight 8267 6835 thecurioussquire.com.au

CRUSH 2013

Wine, Food, FaSHion, MUSiC, aRT adeLaide HiLLS Wine and Food FeSTivaL

Sunday 27 January crushfestival.com.au

I am a professionally trained barista. Did you know that? No one drops to their knees when they see my exceedingly important barista-self shimmering into view. Not a bad idea, though. Prostrate yourself and give my feet a wash when you see me coming. Got it?

Head to The Mac Factory on the weekend if you want a new, unique breakfast experience.

The pick is the bruschetta with ricotta, fresh figs and balsamic vinegar which is beyond compare.

Wash it down with a créme brulee milkshake.

The superior Mac macaroons are made with real fruit squashed in season with the supernatural food colouring that gives the modern macaroon its de rigueur virulent colour.

It is actually spelt and pronounced macaron says Silvana Agostino, the muse and head macaroner behind The Mac Factory. Of course, Silvana is right. Everyone else is wrong.

There are many stories about the history of macarons. Cathy de Medici brought them with her when she married a French Henry? (the 3rd?) A tribe of nuns made them famous in the late 18th century? Pardon the hesitance. I am moving house and my reference books are in boxes. On cue, the internet has gone bung.

I thought the macaron virus would only last a season in the fickle Australian market.

History suggests not.

There is another surprise at the top of the stairs. Silvana has a bookshop specialising in books about food.

I stuck my head in the door and peeked in.

Too dangerous. Too tempting. I have to go cold turkey on food books for a bit.

It is extraordinary that a place with such a narrow focus has thrived. It’s good, that’s why.

The Mac Factory 190b Hutt Street

Photo: Tony Lewis

Hours: Wednesday – Sunday: 10am – 5:30pm Breakfast: Saturday and Sunday 8223 3887 themacfactory.com.au

38

the adelaide REVIEW january 2013

food, wine & coffee

CHEWIN’ THE FAT

do form a valuable part of traditional Australian

Potatoes are a staple in the diet of many

bush food, it is the native fruits and vegetables

western countries; this highly starchy vegetable

that are exceptionally nutritious. In fact, native

is one of the leading contributors to our obesity

Australian flora is beginning to emerge on the

woes. Taro, the native Australian equivalent,

New Year’s resolution eat healthier!

international market as the latest and greatest

makes an ideal substitute for potatoes with far

super foods and supplements.

more protein than its starchy counterpart. As

Jock Zonfrillo

M

One perfect example of just how powerful

an added benefit, taro contains almost three

some of these foods are can be seen with

times as much calcium as one cup of whole fat

gubinge, or terminalia ferdinandianna. This

milk, making it ideal for anyone concerned about

native Australian bush fruit is commonly

musculoskeletal health.

any, I’m sure, have already made

found in Northern Australia, where the local

All in all we have a plethora of ingredients

and broken their New Year’s

communities harvest it. It is small, yellow-

native to this good land which could potentially

resolution but if this year yours

green, about two centimetres long and one

fast track your New Year’s resolution of a

is to eat healthier and you’re looking for

centimetre in diameter. While most people are

healthier diet. In the case of these native

something different, interesting and truly

consuming citrus fruits, guava or papaya for

alternatives you can feel good about eating

healing for the damage you’ve done to your

their Vitamin C content, gubinge, in laboratory

them too as they require a fraction of the water

poor carcass over the festive period, look no

testing, was shown to have measurements of

needed by introduced species and need very

further than native plants.

Vitamin C up to 5230 mg per 100g. Guava by

little attention generally if you choose to grow

There’s a common theory that is promoted in

comparison has only 183mg per 100g. This is

your own. As always, there are some great books

many alternative medicine books on nutrition

about the same amount of Vitamin C as found

available online and in bookstores on the subject

that ‘we should eat foods native to our own

in a human body that is fully saturated with

but also we are available to field any questions

area’. This theory suggests that not only are

Vitamin C.

you may have on Twitter.

these foods better suited to the metabolism of

A therapeutic dose of Vitamin C, often

the residents of the area but also is less prone

recommended for signs of cold and flu or

to pests and bugs that may be present. If you

other infection, is normally 2000mg. To obtain

Jock Zonfrillo is the Head Chef of Magill Estate

are Australian, however, there is even more

this from diet alone would require eating up

twitter.com/zonfrillo

reason to be consuming native Australian food

to two kilograms of broccoli, or, one half of

products over the imported varieties.

a gubinge.

The best-kept secret about native, Australian

The health benefits don’t end with fruit though.

bush foods is their nutritional value. For most

It is possible to generate a native Australian

people, the first things that come to mind are

food pyramid that provides excellent, nutritious

witchetty grubs or green ants and while these

alternatives for all introduced foods.

the adelaide REVIEW january 2013

39

food, wine & coffee

The stylish alternative The Adelaide Hills region will come alive on Sunday, January 27 when over 90 wine labels and 48 cellar doors combine with fashion, music and art for the annual Crush Wine and Food Festival.

theme. I’m also predicting it will be 29 degrees on the day, and considering that I got it exactly right last year, we’ll see if I can do it again.”

Adelaide Hills Wine Region President, John Harvey, claims that Crush is a very unique South Australian event which not only focuses on wine but also entertainment and fashion.

In 2013, the festival organisers have more in store than ever before.

“The pairing of art, music and fashion with wine and food drew record crowds in 2012 and allowed visitors to explore the unique and edgy side of the wine region,” he says. “It’s something that proudly sets Crush apart from other wine festivals. The Adelaide Hills come alive during the Crush Festival and this year more than ever, the region is excited to be working with Paolo Sebastian designer Paul Vasileff, Simon Bryant and Michael Ellis to help showcase the great wine, food and creative inspirations on offer throughout the region.”

crushfestival.com.au

Nina Bertok

W

ith a number of exclusive features in 2013 – including up-to-date blogging from The Wine Punter Michael Ellis and live fashion exhibitions by Paolo Sebastian’s Paul Vasileff) – this year will also see the festivities extend over the January long weekend.

Owned and operated by Garry Sweeney and Sharon Pearson, Mt Lofty Range Vineyards will transform into a fusion of Cajun and Caribbean grooves, the cellar door hosting a reggae band and offering a Cajun barbecue to complement their wines. According to Sweeney, Mt Lofty Range Vineyard will officially launch four brand new wines on the day.

“This will include our new Sauvignon Blanc, Chardonnay, Pinot Noir and our new bubbles.

For us, it’s also about giving something back to the people who have supported us over the last 12 months. An event like this is about the people who buy our wine and who get behind us, as well as what the cellar door can offer to them.

We’re keen to put on a day for people to come up and enjoy the Hills, it’s cost effective and you can have a bit of fun. Rather than just having 20,000 people drinking at a park, the clientele that comes up here is very loyal, they’re wineenthusiasts and the entire day is very relaxed.”

Sweeney – who prides himself on being “spoton in predicting the weather” at Crush each year – says he expects around 300 wine-lovers to make their way to his cellar door at any one point.

“I’m looking forward to having a wine and a bit of fun with such a loyal following that we have.

I hope people enjoy the new wines we’re got as well. Last year we joined up with another cellar door for the Beach Party theme so we had about 600 people around at any one point. This year we’re expecting about 300 for our own Caribbean

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40

the adelaide REVIEW january 2013

food, wine & coffee Mrs Beeton’s Sponge Ingredients 4 eggs Butter – at room temperature Sugar Plain flour Milk 2 teaspoons vanilla extract 1 teaspoon salt

Method

FOOD FOR THOUGHT Annabelle Curtis

I

n 1861 the kitchen belonged to the women of the house, without exception. In that year Mrs Beeton published Beeton’s Book of Household Management, a now famous insight into food, culture and cooking in a Victorian household.

Isabel Beeton compiled and documented how to run the perfect house and although at the time this would include servants, animal husbandry and religion, she is most famous for her early contribution to food. Beeton had vision and confidence in the kitchen. She educated herself on how and what to cook and then published this guide to help all women succeed in running the perfect home. Confidence in the kitchen is definitely the difference between a chef and a humble home cook but this distinction can be changed with some kitchen tips allowing us to cook without hesitation and in fact bake with the conviction of Mrs Beeton herself.

One of the hardest things to master in the kitchen is rice. Some cooks wash the rice until the water runs clear, others soak the rice overnight before cooking and some simply boil in water

until tender. The perfect rice for me is pilaf. A perfect combination of the absorption method and allowing an extra hit of flavour – it is almost a dish in itself! My trick to getting this perfect every time is using one cup of rice to every two cups of stock or water. Sweat onions and garlic off in butter and then add rice and stock, allowing it to come to the boil on the stove then place in the oven for exactly 20 minutes with a lid. Once removed and allowed to rest for five minutes the rice is perfectly fluffy and full of flavour.

Béchamel or white sauce is something that can be a make or break to the home cooks, repertoire.

Mastering a roux can allow you to thicken sauces, pie mixtures or Béchamel without leaving the horrible taste of raw flour or worst of all, lumps.

The perfect roux is made from equal quantities of flour and butter and cooked out slowly over a low heat, allowing the flour time to cook. No lumps come from adding cold milk to the hot roux and whisking the milk in a third at a time.

My favourite trick in the kitchen is a recipe inspired from Mrs Beeton’s guide to housekeeping, the famous Victorian sponge. Baking is a precise task and a recipe is most always called for, but this cake is made from the weight of the eggs in their shell, allowing you to bake at a moment’s notice and with no need to search for a recipe.

Once mastered, this cake becomes a base for your favourite flavour combinations. Although it is hard to beat the combination of raspberry jam and whipped cream, some things can simply never be improved on.

1. Preheat the oven to 180 degrees.

2. Weigh the eggs in their shell.

3. Take the weight of the eggs and weigh out the exact same weight for the butter, sugar, flour and milk.

4. In the bowl of an electric mixer with a paddle attachment, cream the butter and sugar until pale and fluffy.

5. On a medium speed add the first egg followed by one tablespoon of the sifted flour.

Mix until the mixture is combined. Repeat this process for the remaining three eggs.

6. Stop the mixer and add the remaining flour milk, vanilla and salt, start the mixer on a slow speed until combined and then mix on a medium speed for 30 seconds. Be careful not to over mix, you just want the batter to come together.

7. Pour into a 20cm greased cake tin lined with greaseproof paper and bake for 40 minutes or until a skewer comes out clean.

8. Remove from the oven and leave to cool for 10 minutes in the tin, and then gently remove to a cooling rack.

9. When completely cool, slice in half allowing you to sandwich them back together with your favourite filling.

10. Raspberry jam and whipped cream with vanilla pods is the traditional filling and with the compulsory dusting of icing sugar. twitter.com/annabelleats

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the adelaide REVIEW january 2013

41

food, wine & coffee

CHEESE MATTERS Cultured butter Kris Lloyd

G

ood cultured butter is made with time and patience. Careful consideration needs to be given to the cream – where it comes from, how fresh it is, the breed it has come from; Friesian or Jersey cow and the subsequent fat content. In addition, the length of time you culture the cream is critical as is the strain of cultures that achieve the desired flavour profile. Hopefully as I explain the process you will be enriched with the complex and flavoursome offering that results when all these components are perfect. I personally eat a small amount of butter, however, a great cultured butter I can eat like cheese!

Butter is made by simply churning cream until it clots and releases buttermilk. There are two main types of butter: sweet cream butter and cultured butter. Sweet cream butter is churned cream, and is reliant on the quality of the cream, best made when the cream is only hours old.

Cultured butter is more complex, textured and flavoursome, quite the superior version. While cultured butter is familiar to Europeans who have been using it for centuries, it is a relatively new phenomenon here in our young country.

A handful of cultured butter makers have

emerged in Australia. Each offering a slightly different version of the golden delicacy. My experience with butter making is relatively new, however the trial and error processes I undergo are both exciting and rewarding.

We take cream from a local dairy, which is naturally rich and thick without whipping. The cream is inoculated with a selection of cultures and set aside for several days in a controlled environment to develop and ripen. The number of days allowed for this resting period is critical to the flavour profile and needs to researched and understood by the maker. Too long – too cheesy, not long enough and you will create an insipid tasting butter. Once the ripening period is complete the cream is ready to churn, a critical step in establishing the correct texture of the butter. The churning therefore must be monitored very carefully and over churning will

result in a disaster – not unlike margarine!

It is at this point that the butter cries buttermilk.

We collect this and divide it amongst the cheese makers to take home and make delicious pancakes.

The buttermilk is rich, sweet and thick and produces the fluffiest pancakes or pikelets. It’s satisfying knowing that nothing is wasted from the make.

In true artisan fashion once the buttermilk is taken off we then force any remaining buttermilk from the butter by hand. We then wash the butter gently and carefully with filtered water. Failure to remove the buttermilk entirely will cause the butter to spoil quickly and develop rancid notes. A small amount of South Australian Murray River pink salt flakes are folded through before shaping the butter into small cubes ready for chilling and sale.

What is so appealing to me is there is nothing but natural ingredients in a butter made like this – free

The 3rd Annual

Krush Klinic Longview Vineyard 27 January 2013, 12.00–7.00pm

Adelaide v. Sydney street art battle Four of Australia’s hottest artists—Tiff, Stoops (Adelaide), Phibs and Peque (Sydney), duke it out live.

Bus & breakfast packages from The HWY, The Lion, and Colonist Hotels available.

(08) 8388 9694 154 Pound Rd, Macclesfield SA thepiece.com.au

of preservatives, stabilisers, gums and colouring and a flavour that will impress.

A few brave chefs around Adelaide have taken on some of my variations of cultured butter.

Tom Reid from the newly revived Maximillians restaurant has taken a great liking to my blue vein cultured butter. When I first showed Tom the product I had to warn him as I slowly opened the silver paper the butter was wrapped in. The butter is completely covered in blue mould and looks like a piece of butter gone wrong. However, when you put it in your mouth it comes alive with flavour!

Tom serves it with his house made sourdough, but explains to me I have to take it out to the customers and introduce it. Such a pleasure working with chefs that get new and innovative food. Tom also serves the blue vein butter with his dry aged porterhouse steak.

We also have a truffle butter, whiskey washed butter and an unsalted version for cooking. If you haven’t had the opportunity to try cultured butter I highly recommend you do. Pepe Saya, Myrtleford Butter Factory and Bangalow Cheese Company all produce good Australian cultured butters. Served with fresh crusty warm bread is simply one of the best ways to show off good quality cultured butter. My favourite is fresh mushrooms lightly pan-fried with our truffle butter, a perfect match for a good steak!

Kris Lloyd is Woodside’s Head Cheesemaker woodsidechesse.com.au

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the adelaide REVIEW january 2013

food, wine & coffee

Lighten up David Ridge reviews four lighter style reds of differing weight and intensity. These are part of an increasing trend to a lightness in reds, which Australians are starting to embrace all year round.

2012 Dal Zotto Rosato King Valley, Vic RRP: $19.50 dalzotto.com.au The Dal Zotto family’s approach to the use of their Italian varietals has been studied and successful. That is, they have also come to use them with Italian stylistic benchmarks in mind. This is important and is obviously at play in this lovely vibrant rose, a blend of the central Italian favourite Sangiovese with the north east’s much-loved Barbera.

Both varieties are generally able to make easy drinking or ‘serious’ wines. Each offers its imprint: cherry fruits and a tingling savoury finish from Sangiovese and the generous Barbera contributes lovely plum skin and fleshiness. This wine is bright, fresh and clean, like any well made Australian rose, but it’s also got that ready aptitude for a variety of foods, which happily is becoming the norm with more (most?) wines of this type here. It gave me exactly what I anticipated and I can see more botts of this sitting with a range of dishes this summer: from the raw, cured or carpaccio-ed, to the deep fried or fiery.

Hot 100 Wines

THE ADELAIDE REVIEW

SOUTH AUSTRALIAN

2011 Ata Rangi ‘Crimson’ Pinot Noir

2011 Lenotti Bardolino Classico

2010 Prunotto Dolcetto d’Alba

Martinborough, NZ RRP: $35 atarangi.co.nz

Veneto, Italy RRP: $18 lenotti.it

Piedmont, Italy RRP: $25 prunotto.it

Talk about ‘crimson’! Not sure I have got this one right. Well maybe not for the purpose of suggesting a wine for use this summer, but here is surely a Pinot Noir of clear quality and promise. There are only a handful of other Kiwis who rival Clive Paton for experience in the Pinot caper and he’s ensured that this one delivers great quality and authenticity for very reasonable dollars. Although this is not their senior wine, it’s not new vines either, coming from mature plantings of 10 to 20 years of age, in the long-established and proven Pinot super zone of Martinborough on the lower north Island of NZ. It’s all primary crimson fruits, of plum, cranberry and cherry and in lieu of real age, other things, like spices are still shy. The palate is big and vigorous at the moment, but it does have a superb, correct, tight and tingling Pinot finish. This is nice now, but its great days lie ahead – maybe three to five years ideally. It’s also in halves, for that very rare occasion you might find yourself one-out with your Peking duck.

“Where have you been?” is the frequent reaction to this lovely light-medium red from near Lake Garda in Italy’s north east. Now for the lover of the Australian (or for that matter any) type of brawny red, this might be a bit wussie, and with eyes closed it might seem more like a white that just happens to be red. Lovely plum and cherry skin fruits, with quite a bit of presence emerge with a little breathing and with nice texture and length, supported by gentle but persistent tannins this gradually presents itself with a bit more force than initially. It’s a type of red, which could be a model in this often hot and humid climate and with our food preferences moving to include far more fire, spice and herbs from just north of us, and reminds, if anything of Pinot Noir. It goes with lots of foods, adapts to most situations and even takes a bit of chilling without its tannins getting bitter. Let’s see more of these.

This is actually quite dark, but not big – if you know what I mean? In the pecking order of Piedmont’s red varieties, Dolcetto sits third, after the generous and adaptable Barbera and the great Nebbiolo, and it’s never meant to ask you for big dollars. When at its top form though, like this wine, it is a red of instant appeal, being juicy and mouthfillng and finishing savoury and lively, yet not big or cumbersome. Unlike Dolcetto’s senior siblings this is very adaptable food wine and is used at origin for the everyday wine which can also step up to provide a little more intrigue and complexity if needed. This famous Piemontese producer now sits in the Antinori stable, where it is allowed to run independently and take advantage of some wonderful vineyard resources. So this is an excellent look at a Piedmont variety and at Piemontese style for very good money. Its ideal partners would be a tuna steak, carpaccio or vitello tonnato, but it ranges easily beyond just Italian fare.

HOT 100 SA WINES FLIPBOOK AVAILABLE ONLINE V I S I T A D E L A I D E R E V I E W. C O M . A U

the adelaide REVIEW january 2013

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food, wine & coffee

A liberation theology for wine?

Charles Gent

T

he natural wine movement, with its potted philosophy of “Nothing added, nothing taken away”, is in full cry. To underline its ascendancy, one of its most committed acolytes, Anton Von Klopper, has just topped The Adelaide Review’s Hot 100 South Australian Wines 2012 with his multi-variety red wine, the Domaine Lucci Noir de Florette.

With natural wines the target of more than a little scepticism from winemaking’s mainstream, Von Klopper could be the man to change minds.

He is not a puritanical zealot – advocate and enthusiast, yes, but humourless hardliner, no.

In common with the followers of the biodynamic and organic movements (and there is considerable overlap in the principles as well as the personnel involved), the naturalists can be seen as a reaction to the deference afforded to science in Australian winemaking.

Von Klopper and a group of like-minded mates believe that the “cleaning up” of Australian wines that began in the 1980s went too far. The result, Von Klopper says, has been wines made to a formula and “a loss of ingenuity”, not to mention a rapid decline in international appeal.

“Suddenly our wines weren’t wanted

anywhere,” he said.

An honours graduate of the Waite oenology course, Von Klopper is no out-and-out Luddite, but he does believe that the standard approach to winemaking is, in essence, back-to-front: science in its proper role, he says, is kept in reserve to fix problems, not used “preemptively” to determine the style of a wine.

Natural winemakers are conscientious objectors to the dominant model of pristine hygiene and immaculate “balance”. Techniques such as fining, filtering and the addition of acid or tannin are all dirty words in their lexicon, although most, like Von Klopper, are willing to unbend as far as using minimal sulphur to stop their wines going off.

He has no use, though, for stainless steel in his winemaking, nor is he a fan of the screwcap.

In somewhat grumpy mode, English Decanter editor Robert Joseph recently opined that as long as natural wine has no legal definition, the term is meaningless. Certainly it has been invoked as the inspiration – or as an excuse – for a multitude of eccentric and sometimes peculiar wines.

Von Klopper isn’t too concerned by the niceties of definition; he agrees that there is a variety of practice, product and quality that falls under the banner, but that, he says, is part of the point.

He is also no fan of the modern fashion for

Hot 100 Wines

THE ADELAIDE REVIEW

SOUTH AUSTRALIAN

varietal purity. He finds his inspiration in generic wine styles; the Noir de Florette, as a case in point, is his Basket Range tribute to the style of the Gamay-based wines of Burgundy.

Von Klopper said that the popular and official suspicion that greeted the advent of natural wines is gradually abating.

And now that the homogenised, monolithic branding of Australian wine has come seriously unstuck and the new flag of regional variety has been hastily hoisted, it has dawned on national marketers Wine Australia that in their frantic search for exponents of terroir, natural wines may be worth promoting after all.

Anton Von Klopper has no expectation of, or ambition for, natural winemaking to take over the industry, and he respects the role of the big companies. “The industry needs many faces,” he says.

But, he says, the scientific practices learned at wine school and among the tank farms shouldn’t be treated as a be-all and end-all: rather they are “a pathway to freedom”.

One can’t help enjoying the attitude of a man who unselfconsciously uses words like “wildness”, “dreaming” and “beauty” to describe the basis of his own winemaking approach. So crack a magnum of Noir de Florette – it’s been put in a big bottle to help it go further at the table – and see what you think.

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the adelaide REVIEW january 2013

coffee

There’s no café like home Derek Crozier

A

t the early stages of my lifelong commitment to coffee, I remember a sales rep who came into the café I was working in. The rep dropped off a sample for the boss to try which the boss then offered to me to take home as he was loyal to his current supplier. As soon as the café closed, I used the grinder to grind the beans before leaving. When I got home, I was faced with the ‘I have nothing to brew it with’ dilemma but I didn’t care, I was determined to try this coffee so I started to think like MacGyver and get creative. I found an old squashed teabag in the back of the cupboard and pulled off the string, carefully tore it open, poured out the tea, started spooning in the ground coffee and used the string to tie it back up again. It did work but I realised that this would be too time consuming on a daily basis so from that day on, I started saving for my first espresso machine.

Some coffee boutiques have different brewing methods on offer for you to try, so pick the barista’s brain to find out what method could suit you for your home brewing.

A few home brewing methods you may come across are: plunger (French press), stovetop (mocha pot), drip filter, pods, siphon, aeropress, Turkish (Ibrik), Vietnamese (flat drip), and espresso.

Home sized espresso machines are available in automatic or manual. Some people like the automatic option where all you have to do is push a button; the beans are ground fresh, the milk is heated and out comes your latte.

This is a great option for someone who finds the manual machines a bit intimidating or just don’t care for the making process. The down side is the automatic machines have lots of small plastic parts. They can break quite frequently and without your morning cuppa you could end up ‘sleeping’ your way to work. Whereas most manual machines are made in Italy with quality parts, and if looked after, can last a lifetime.

An automatic machine is quick and easy but what if I told you a manual machine can

be just as fast, providing the consumer has the right tools and basic training (sometimes supplied with a machine purchase). The time it takes you to prepare the ground coffee and cold milk, the machine is hot and ready to go, then it only takes 15 to 30 seconds to extract the espresso and 30 to 40 seconds to stretch and texture the milk. After enjoying your cup, rinse out the milk jug and put the used coffee on the garden (it keeps away the snails).

Making a coffee manually can lead to a café level of satisfaction on your day off or even a fulfilment from the small achievement before work.

Depending on your level of interest, or if you don’t want to spend too much of your hard earned beans, but still want better than the trusty instant then maybe a pod machine is for you. They are completely automatic and you can now get empty pod capsules so you’re free to fill them with any ground coffee you wish.

When it comes to buying beans for home, just like tasting certain characteristics in wine, you can ask which flavour profiles will come from which beans and which brewing method is recommended to get the optimum of those flavours. Some beans can taste completely different depending on which way they’re brewed and within each method there are variations to create different flavour profiles, for example: the length of time the coffee is infused with the water to the temperature it’s brewed in.

So no matter where you live in the world or what your personal tastes are, there will always be a method of brewing that ‘morning cup of glory’ in a way that satisfies your needs.

Derek Crozier is the Managing Director of Freshly Ground Studio freshlygroundstudio.com.au

the adelaide REVIEW january 2013

45

coffee

Coffee Break with Tony Gentilcore Owner/ barista of roaster and cafe La Crema Coffee, Tony Gentilcore provides some insight into what makes a great roast and cup.

We source our green beans worldwide. La Crema profile and roast all single origin beans at different temperatures to extract flavours.

Custom blending is suited to the customer’s need.

Can you explain what made you want to pursue a career in coffee?

Coffee runs through my blood. I just have a huge passion and love for all things coffee.

Your first cup of the day – what is it?

Espresso.

Do you believe Adelaide is entering an age of professional baristas?

Yes.

Is the rise of specialty coffee houses all over Adelaide a healthy sign for the industry?

What are some cafe/coffee pet hates that you won’t find at La Crema Coffee?

It’s great for the coffee industry as it gives the

Burnt coffee, not extracting proper shots and

customers a wide range of choice to try different

overheating milk are on the top of my coffee

coffee, blends and brews from differing baristas

pet hate list.

and cafes across the city.

What makes La Crema’s coffee different to others you will find around Adelaide?

La Crema Coffee is a boutique coffee roasting company. We roast small batches to procure the

La Crema Coffee 678 South Road Glandore laceremacoffee.com.au

highest quality possible from the beans.

Can you tell us about some of the beans, blends and flavor profiles of La Crema’s coffee?

Tony Gentilcore

46

the adelaide REVIEW january 2013

food, wine & coffee the curious squire opening

This month

The new O’Connell Street hotspot launched on Wednesday, December 12.

The Adelaide Review’s guide to January’s highlight food &wine events

Clockwise from top right: Tina Zissis, Rhianna Wadin; Melissa Mack, Cheyne Gates; Emma Pittman, Alfie Brown; Katie Bartold, Héléne Sobolewski; Jessica Magliulo, Roxy Allan; Terry Feltus, Bill Moody; Marian Tropeano, Arja Koehonew, Sashi Assmann; Colleen Tropeano, Caitlin Kerins; Toh Cooper, Sarah Maddock, Martin Daunt, Amanda Hank, Jack Daniel.

Coriole Carnivale

Photos: Jonathan van der Knaap

Coriole Vineyards, McLaren Vale Thursday, January 3, 7pm-1am coriole.com

Music and short films will accompany food and wine in three areas of Coriole’s Vineyards as global music, jazz and acoustic rock jives with Argentinian street food and wine. Tickets: $67. The event is 18+.

Movies Under the Stars (Hugo) Jacob’s Creek Visitor Centre Barossa Valley Way, Rowland Flat Friday, January 11 jacobscreek.com

Hugo

E n j o y M a r t i n S c o r s e s e ’s m o d e r n spectacle Hugo at Jacob’s Creek’s outdoor cinema amongst the vines while enjoying a glass of wine and/or platters, popcorn and dessert options while in relax mode. Cost: $15. Movies continue until Friday, February 22.

Regional and Seasonal Adelaide Central Market Friday, January 25, 5-7pm

Adelaide Central Market

adelaidecentralmarket.com.au

Gourmet producers will show you how to throw the perfect outdoor dinner party on the Downstairs Stage of the Central Market.

Crush 2013 Sunday, January 27

Adelaide Hills

crushfestival.com.au

Sunday, January 27

SUNDAY 27TH JANUARY, 9AM – 5PM

Visit www.ngeringa.com for more details.

119 Williams Rd, Mt Barker Summit, Adelaide Hills T/F: +61 8 8398 2867 wine@ngeringa.com

longviewvineyard.com.au

Open Friday - Sunday 11am - 5pm European-inspired, biodynamic wines Estate-grown ‘From the Paddock’ Tasting Plate Monthly Pizza Sundays, next firing up 24th February

Longview Krush Klinic

Summer-inspired breakfast and lunch menus by Andy Davies of Press* featuring our estate-grown produce. Live music. Fine art with Worth Gallery.

Longview Krush Klinic Pound Road, Macclesfield

CRUSH 2013

Celebrate the Adelaide Hills’ Crush festival at NGERINGA to a biodynamics theme. Learn what biodynamics is and why we practice it in the second of our Conversation Sessions. Speaker Erinn Klein.

The annual Adelaide Hills celebration of wine and produce returns with 90 wine labels and 48 cellar doors combining for this festival of food, wine and entertainment.

Last year more than 1200 people trekked to Longview for Krush Klinic to witness Australia’s finest street artists battle it out to grace the label of a Longview Zhiraz. This year an American style BBQ will accompany the festivities.

the adelaide REVIEW january 2013

FORM DE SIGN

PLANNING

INNOVATION

MASH

Australian Institute of Landscape Architects

MASH The Adelaide design agency dominated the recent AGDA awards.

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45 park This city fringe development offers Adelaide’s version of Central Park views.

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Zenith Zenith Interiors opened their stunning new Pultney Street showroom.

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the adelaide REVIEW january 2013

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Mash it up Adelaide’s Mash is the toast of Australia’s graphic design community cleaning up at the recent Australian Graphic Design Association (AGDA) Biennale with 23 awards, as well as a Judge’s Choice for their 2012 Adelaide Festival design.

David Knight

T

he brainchild of owners and directors James Brown and Dom Roberts, Mash’s journey to becoming a leading design agency began in 2001 when the designers were freelancers fresh out of uni.

“James just came to my house with his iMac, straight out of the boot of his car, to save himself sitting in a room by himself going stir crazy,”

Roberts remembers. “We were doing a couple of little jobs together and it basically started from there.

James and I studied together and were a little bit competitive. We both liked each other’s stuff: ‘Damn, look at James’ stuff it looks awesome... bastard’.”

One of the first major jobs Mash scored was for hair product evo. Now an established hip high-end hair and beauty product, evo was in need of a rebranding after failing the market with a commercial approach. Brown and Roberts were advanced individually to do the project.

“We’ve been doing evo since day dot,” Roberts says. “That was quiet daunting, we were just out of uni and we both worked out we’d been approached to do the same thing. We decided to pitch to them together as we knew each other and had worked together. They already had done something, there was something in the market but it wasn’t working. It was very run of the mill.

It just got lost in the sea of thousands of other competitors. It wasn’t bad, it just wasn’t working.

We came on and did some stuff and it was quiet for a year or two. They came back and said, ‘We’re ready to put everything into practice’. We’re fussy designers and said, ‘No, no, no, that’s gone. That’s two years old, we need to do something new.’”

Mash still works with evo recently completing their new campaign. Since those humble beginnings Mash has become the design heartbeat of cool Adelaide with their graphics and ideas adorning our city and state’s bars, wine labels, album covers, interiors and cultural festivals. “We just do what we love and do what we think looks great and is going to work for our clients to make their business a success,” a humble Roberts says.

“That’s where we come from.”

Currently home to eight employees, Mash is more than just a cutting edge Adelaide agency; it

“

“They found out about us, and two in particular, were just pushing stuff our way saying, ‘We’ve just been to Australia we love these guys’ wine but hate their packaging. We told them if they want to sell to the US through us they will have to change it. Expect a phone call.’ That happened a lot.”

the adelaide REVIEW january 2013

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form is one of the finest in the country, which is backed by their AGDA success. After taking home 21 awards in 2010 and eight in 2008 (which included the illustrious Pinnacle Award), Mash won the most awards of any Australian design agency in 2012 with 23 gongs. This success was punctuated by the Adelaide Festival design – which rebranded the cultural festival icon as a fashionable and edgy event without rejecting the Festival’s class – that ultimately won a Judge’s Choice.

The iconic Festival rebranding led Mash to become the first company to complete consecutive festivals, as they were responsible for 2013’s design. But the 2012 design is still the one that shines as it opened the Festival to a new audience with its Peter Saville/Factory Records edge.

“We did lots of concepts,” Roberts explains about the 2012 design. “We had photographic and conceptual ideas that we talked about but in the end it was decided on something more graphic based.

We did a whole bunch of colour studies, we painted and had a ball freezing blocks of water and milk with food colouring in it. We watched it melt, took photos and just went to town with it. Finally we did this painting, which just featured parts dripping, and something in that was nice. We put this angle in it and it was a nice balance where you weren’t sure if it was computer generated or if it was done by hand. It was like a photo that looked like a painting.”

Then there’s the wine labeling. Mash has reinvigorated wine labels in this state with their eclectic, eye-catching designs for both the boutique and commercial markets. Their wine designs were showcased at San Francisco’s Museum of Modern

Art and curiously it was American distributors who sent them on their wine path.

“They found out about us, and two in particular, were just pushing stuff our way saying, ‘We’ve just been to Australia we love these guys’ wine but hate their packaging. We told them if they want to sell to the US through us they will have to change it.

Expect a phone call.’ That happened a lot.”

Some of Mash’s finest work was for Alpha Box & Dice, and they did more than just design the McLaren Vale winery’s labels, curating the interior to their cellar door. “It’s basically just a tin shed.

The budget wasn’t massive but we wanted to be involved with it. We curated the whole place, created some hand painted signs, collected pieces and it worked really well.”

Mash also has a creative stream, LAW, which stands for the Laboratorium of Art for Wonder.

“It’s basically non-client work. We’ve done a few things; food photo shoots, we made some plates and gave them out to our clients, all hand created. We worked with an artist called Gerry Wedd, who did a lot of Mambo stuff back in the day. He lives in Pt Elliott and James did a lot of stuff with him. There might be an exhibition one day but no immediate plans as we’re too busy with frickin’ client work. We don’t have time.”

mashdesign.com.au

Recharge & Move Forward…

According to the world's leading colourexperts, Pantone’s colourof the year 'Tangerine Tango’marries the vivaciousness of red with the friendliness and warmth of yellow, providing the energy boost we need to rechargeand move forward.

Dane Arm Chair

Jensen Sofa

A perfect burst into spring, Design Furniture presents this uplifting colourin an exciting new‘Danish Retro’ collection.

Our award winning collection is beautifully complimented with a retrospect look at the Australian legendary designer Florence Broadhurst, whose life crossed over with the Danish Retro Period.

Florence’s work is in increasing demand as a new generation embraces the talents of such a captivating woman whose legacy will no doubt live on for many years to come.

Visit us at www.designfurniture.com.au.

Matisse Chair

Klein Sofa

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the adelaide REVIEW january 2013

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Adelaide’s Central Park One of the most intriguing Adelaide developments is 45 Park. Located on the old Channel 7 site, the residential apartment sanctuary is bounded by Linear Park, the River Torrens and the Parklands with images on the website offering views from 45 Park’s apartments that reminds one of New York’s Central Park.

Christopher Sanders

[its] proximity to the city”.

“

“Importantly the notion of providing a

Certainly the Central Park notion was in

contained lifestyle environment to residents

the back of our minds,” Tony Giannone,

in a sanctuary atmosphere was paramount

Director of Tectvs Pty Ltd, explains.

hence the ‘inner parklands’ of some 6000

“There are certain similarities in regard

square metres was conceptualised.”

to views and outlook towards a central park, in this case Adelaide’s parklands.”

With 217 apartments located in three buildings ranging from six to 10 stories, the

Aside from the view, 45 Park is an exciting

design of the CBD fringe development is

project, as half the Gilberton, Walkerville site is

intended to create a sense of community with

dedicated to lifestyle facilities, which includes

shared facilities for occupants to enjoy and

communal gardens, an indoor pool and

gather including a landscaped design walkway

gymnasium. The design encourages a no car

that connects the entrance and buildings lined

lifestyle promoting open space, sustainability

with trees, bollards and urban art to create a

by being close to transport options. Giannone

walking environment.

says that although he researched other developments in other cities, he believes 45 Park is “unique in many regards in that it is

45park.com.au

bounded by both parklands and the river and

Zenith’s new showroom

Z mark.robinson@2xeed.com.au www.2xeedconsulting.com 2Xeed Consulting is a simple yet effective business that utilises 20 years of experience and strong relationships in the Adelaide

Construction, Design & Architectural fields to provide the following: • Significantly improving

• Increasing profitability

perception of your business,

• Improving communication

services, and your brand.

methods.

• Connecting Business to Business

• Challenging thinking

• Skills Matching appropriate

• Problem Solving

resources

• Coaching, Mentoring

• Jointly targeting key projects

and Training

for effective outcomes

enith recently moved to their new showroom, L2, 211 Pulteney St. The company has experienced continued growth over their nine-year history and were reluctant to move from their Chesser St showroom, however, the need to have a larger showroom to display their comprehensive furniture range made the move necessary.

An opening party was held recently to celebrate the occasion with over 320 clients and suppliers attending. One of the many highlights was the mechanical surfboard riding competition. Zenith now displays locally designed and manufactured Australian products including the newly acquired Shamburg + Alvisse along with a collection of European products ranges.

Zenith L2, 211 Pulteney St zenithinteriors.com.au

CHANGE YOUR SURROUNDINGS WITH A BUILT ENVIRONMENT DEGREE.

the adelaide REVIEW january 2013

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CRICOS Provider Code: 00113B DEA0495

Whether you’re completing an undergraduate qualification, or have been working in the industry, now’s the time to change your surroundings with an Architecture and Built Environment degree at Deakin University.

Visit deakin.edu.au/scitech/arcmr or call 1300 DEGREE (1300 334 733) for more information.

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the adelaide REVIEW january 2013