Sydney

The Great Clock in the QVB

| cjlevinson

The Great Australia Clock in the Queen Victoria Building

Days turn to years
As life passes
Before my eyes:
Time waits for no one

A belated Happy New Year to all of my friends and readers out there. I hope 2012 will be a good year for you and everyone close to you.

Thank you to everyone who left comments and sent me emails over the New Year. I had meant to post before now but unfortunately I haven’t been feeling that well lately, so this has been my first chance to post since Christmas. I will have an update about my writing and a few other things finished soon but in the meantime I thought I‘d post a quick photo.

I took this photo inside Sydney’s Queen Victoria Building just before Christmas. The clock is called the Great Australia Clock and is one of two beautiful mechanical clocks in the QVB. It’s ten metres tall, weighs four tonnes and is decorated with 33 dioramas depicting scenes from Australia’s history.

The QVB is one of my favourite buildings in Sydney and I’ve always admired this clock, not just for its ornate beauty but particularly because the dioramas show both Aboriginal and European perspectives on our history.

I edited the photo over the New Year, while I was thinking about how quickly the year had passed and everything that had happened, both personally and globally, and I guess that was what was on my mind when I wrote the haiku. Time seems to go by so quickly these days… all we can really do is hope to make the most of it.

Photo and haiku © CJ Levinson 2011
Like this photo? Click here to buy it for $5

Christmas in Randwick

| cjlevinson

Randwick Town Hall, decorated for Christmas

As it’s Christmas Eve I thought I’d post some of the Christmas photos I’ve taken near where I live. Randwick comes alive at this time of year, with lots of houses and businesses putting up decorations and it’s a lot of fun walking around and seeing what’s new. These are some of my favourites from this year.

Most of the houses are from Frederick Street, which is known for its Christmas displays and has won awards in the past; there are a few photos from Bondi Junction as well which I took while shopping. There are about 20 photos so I’ve split them after the jump; you can click on any of them to see larger versions as well.

I’m just finishing my annual Christmas song now as well… will have it posted sometime tomorrow. This year’s is an Aussie version of “Deck the Halls”. Should be fun! 🙂

Continue reading →

Cenotaph at Christmas

| cjlevinson

Bronze soldiers
Monuments to war
From another time:
We remember

I was in the Sydney CBD yesterday, looking at the Christmas decorations and doing some late shopping. The crowds were awful, particularly in the shops, but the atmosphere was quite festive and pleasant and I actually had a lot of fun walking around, taking photos.

I took this photo in Martin Place, outside the Sydney Cenotaph, where people were leaving Christmas cards and flowers in remembrance. The cenotaph was constructed in 1927 to remember the fallen from World War I; it is used extensively in the ANZAC and Armistice Day dawn services each year, drawing thousands of people.

As of December Australia has approximately 3,000 personnel stationed overseas, 1,500 of which are in Afghanistan. 2011 has been a horror year for Australian casualties; of the 32 deaths Australia has suffered in Afghanistan, 11 have been this year alone.

Please keep all of our soldiers and their families in your thoughts this Christmas.

Photo and haiku © CJ Levinson 2011

Another Christmas

| cjlevinson

Westfield Reindeer

Another Christmas
A time of mirth and laughter:
My heart misses you

Listening to carols
Thinking of old friends:
Must be Christmas
Again

Sphere and Reindeer

I took these photos on Thursday night in Bondi Junction. Every year the two Westfield centres are beautifully decorated for Christmas and this reindeer display is my favourite; it hangs down across all six levels and is exquisite when the light catches it just right.

It always amazes me how quickly the season seems to come around each year… it hardly feels like more than a few months since last Christmas. Time goes by so quickly these days.

I enjoy the time of year but it always feels a little bittersweet to me as well as I often think about family and friends overseas and others who are no longer in our lives. I guess that’s what was on my mind when I wrote the haiku, the mixed feelings the season often brings.

Photos and haiku © CJ Levinson 2011

Mossy Rocks

| cjlevinson

Mossy Rocks

Sitting by the sea,
Watching a distant sun set
On another day 

I took this photo on Wednesday afternoon near Bondi Beach. I’d just been to see the Sculptures by the Sea exhibit; it had been raining heavily all day and I was well and truly soaked but just as I reached the promenade overlooking the beach, it stopped and the sun came out. The light lit the water beautifully and I took a quick shot with my 60D. I really like how it came out, particularly the colours.

It started raining again a few minutes later and the light disappeared. I hurried to get under shelter but I guess I was just lucky to be in the right place at the right time; a minute or two later and I’d have missed the shot completely.

I took a number of shots at the Sculptures exhibit as well but this ended up being my favourite of the day, mostly because it was so unexpected. It just shows how much natural beauty there is all around us… we just need to know how to see it.

Photo and haiku © CJ Levinson 2011

Sydney Harbour Bridge and Ferry

| cjlevinson

Ferry & Bridge

A Letter of Hope to Sydney Cove, near Botany Bay
Erasmus Darwin (1789)

Where Sydney Cove her lucid bosom swells
Courts her young navies and the storm repels,
High on a rock, amid the troubled air,
Hope stood sublime, and wav’d her golden hair;
Calm’d with her rosy smile the tossing deep,
And with sweet accents charm’d the winds to sleep;
To each wild plain, she stretch’d her snowy hand,
High-waving wood, and sea-encircled strand.
‘Hear me,’ she cried, ‘ye rising realms! Record
Time’s opening scenes, and Truth’s unerring word.
There shall broad streets their stately walls extend,
The circus widen, and the crescent bend;
There ray’d from cities o’er the cultur’d land,
Shall bright canals, and solid roads expand. —
There the proud arch, Colossus-like, bestride
Yon glittering streams, and bound the chasing tide;
Embellish’d villas crown the landscape scene,
Farms wave with gold, and orchards blush between. —
There shall tall spires, and dome-capt towers ascend,
And piers and quays their massy structures blend;
While with each breeze approaching vessels glide,
And northern treasures dance on every tide!’
Here ceased the nymph—tumultuous echoes roar,
And Joy’s loud voice was heard from shore to shore —
Her graceful steps descending press’d the plain;
And Peace, and Art, and Labour, join’d her train.

I took this photo during a recent trip to Taronga Zoo. I was waiting for the ferry at Circular Quay and realised that I’d been there dozens of times before but had never actually taken a photo of the Bridge, something I’d always wanted to do… I guess living in Sydney I’d always assumed there’d be some other time and had just never got round to it. So this time I made myself take a few shots.

I particularly like how this one came out. The couple looking at the Bridge were tourists and they walked into the shot by accident at the last moment but I think they add a lot to it… they almost make me feel like I’m seeing it anew through their eyes.

The poem above is one of my favourites, A Letter of Hope to Sydney Cove, near Botany Bay by Erasmus Darwin (Charles Darwin’s grandfather). He wrote it in 1789 to accompany a small number of medallions created by Josiah Wedgwood to commemorate the settlement of Sydney Cove and it’s always struck me how eerily he predicts the city that would one day rise in its place. I thought it made an interesting contrast to the photo.

Photo © CJ Levinson 2011
Like this photo? Click here to buy it for $5

Where the Dead Rest

| cjlevinson

Waverley Cemetery

Marble tombs
Forgotten by the world:
Where the dead rest
Forevermore

Went to Gosford yesterday to look at a few houses to rent (no luck unfortunately). It was a long drive and on the way back I went for a short walk around Bronte to stretch my legs. I took this photo outside Waverley Cemetery, just before sunset.

The cemetery opened in 1877 and is one of the most historic sites in Sydney. It’s a lovely spot on the top of cliffs overlooking the ocean and many notable people are buried there, including poet Henry Lawson and Edmund Barton, Australia’s first Prime Minister.

I’ve walked around the cemetery before but for some reason the condition of many of the graves seemed to jump out at me yesterday. The cemetery is well cared for but many of the graves are so old now that they’re almost impossible to read and walking by, I kept wondering who they were, what lives they had lived – if they were remembered. I guess we’ll never know.

It makes me wonder how we’ll be remembered, in 140 years.

Photo and haiku © CJ Levinson 2011

This photo almost got me arrested…

| cjlevinson

Bicycle Rack or Art?

A bicycle rack in Belmore Road, Randwick, shaped like a Penny Farthing. ~ © CJ Levinson 2011

… well, not exactly arrested. But I guess I should start at the beginning.

I went for a quick walk last night and took this photo while I was out. It’s one of a number of bicycle racks commissioned by Randwick City Council that have appeared around Randwick over the last few months; they’re shaped like old Penny Farthings and are meant to mix art and function to make everyday objects seem more interesting. They’ve sparked something of a debate locally about whether they’re art, utilities or just a waste of money but personally I like them; I love the design and anything that makes people think about cycling seems like a good idea to me.

I’ve been wanting to take a photo of one of the bicycle racks for a while as they’re so distinctive and finally got the chance to last night. The light was just right and I like how it came out; I was even lucky enough that a young couple were just crossing the road as I took the shot, which adds a nice dimension to it.

I didn’t see it as I took the photo but the car on the right was actually a police car and just after I took the shot, a female officer yelled at me and demanded to know what I was doing. Continue reading →

Historic Sydney

| cjlevinson

This is my first post in a while. I haven’t been feeling well and to make things worse I’ve been having computer problems as well. I can barely use my computer at the moment; it makes a constant grinding noise and just crashes without warning. I even lost some of my work yesterday when it crashed. No backups. Ouch. I’ve been putting it off but I’ll have to get it looked at later this week. Hopefully it won’t be too expensive to fix.

I’ve got a pile of emails and comments in my inbox I haven’t been able to get to yet (sorry!) but one good thing is it’s given me more time to write. I’ve finally been able to develop a few ideas further and I also started an early draft of a new story which is going well so far.

One of the stories I’ve been working on is based on an older idea, about a man who wakes from a coma only to find that the world he knew is gone. I haven’t had much time to work on it previously but I’ve always liked the idea and wanted to develop it further. At its heart it’s about exploring our world through the eyes of a stranger and it’s still only in the early stages but already it feels quite different to anything I’ve written before. I could see it being a novel one day.

I’ve been doing some research for the story (when my computer’s been working anyway), looking at how different trends change over time, and The Commons on Flickr has been an excellent resource. If you don’t use Flickr, The Commons is a photographic archive from different institutions around the world and it’s been fascinating looking at the collections, seeing how things like architecture, fashion and hairstyles have evolved over time.

The Powerhouse Museum and the NSW State Library are both part of The Commons and some of the images of Sydney are incredible; they date back to the beginning of the 20th century, some to even earlier when the colony was still forming. Most of the buildings don’t exist anymore and it’s an incredible insight into what life was really like back then.

The photo above is one of my favourites. It dates back to around 1920 and is of Marie-Celeste de Villentroy, the daughter of a photographer in Sydney at the time. It’s a beautiful portrait, hand-coloured. It’s also one of the few times I’ve seen the Red Ensign flag used so noticeably.

I spent Australia Day looking through The Commons last week and as I haven’t posted in a while, I thought it’d be fun to post some of my favourites photos. To share a little history. Most are of common landmarks in Sydney and should be familiar to people overseas.

There are quite a few photos, so I’ve posted more after the break. Enjoy.

This photo is of Market Street in the CBD, around 1875. The buildings were made of weatherboard and sanitation was a notorious problem in the area. You can see how the plague spread so rapidly a few years later. Rent was 21 shillings.

A view of Sydney from the old General Post Office in Martin Place (1900), in the central CBD. Many of these buildings were knocked down for development during the 1900s. The GPO was privatised in 1996 and now houses shops and cafes.

Martin Place, circa 1900. Martin Place was originally Moore Street and has changed a lot in 100 years but much of it is still recognisable. It was closed to traffic in 1971 and is now a pedestrian mall.

Queen Victoria Markets (1900), now the Queen Victoria Building. The QVB is one of my favourite buildings in Sydney; it’s mostly untouched and the inside has been carefully restored with many of its original features.

More photos after the break