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Unlike most South Australia towns Ceduna was founded in the 20th century when the optimism of the 19th century farmers had waned. Early explorers had not reported favourably on the land here. Edward John Eyre made his visit to the region in 1839 after sailing to Port Lincoln and then he explored it again in 1840/41. On his second trip he complained about the lack of any water after a ship had provided water to him at Streaky Bay. His party then walked as there was no water for horses. This fateful journey, when Aborigines killed two of his party and Eyre and his Aboriginal friend Wylie nearly died of thirst, Eyre managed to cross the Nullarbor Plain to WA. But none of his reports encouraged settlers. Two explorers Miller and Dutton in 1857 noted no water but said there were good areas of grasslands. The first large pastoral leaseholds were taken up in 1860 but soon surrendered and taken up again after 1868. This was tough country even for sheep. Robert Barr Smith took out the Fowlers Bay run which included Murat Bay and covered 199 square miles. Other leaseholds were also taken up along the coast. All were resumed by the government in the late 1880s when the hundreds were declared. The Hundred of Bonython which covers Ceduna was declared in 1893 and a small farming community began on Murat Bay at Denial Bay. Thirty early settler families petitioned the government for a surveyed town in 1896. This happened in 1901 and it was named Murat Bay. But the town developed very slowly. The first church opened in 1909; the government school only opened in 1914 and minimal development occurred before 1915 when the railway from Port Lincoln reached the town. Before the railway arrived the first government wharf and jetty was built in 1904 to take away the bagged grain at a cost over £6,000; an early stone Institute building was erected; there were two early general stores; the town had a stone hotel –licensed to Mr Charles Mudge in 1901 for opening in 1902; the first police station opened in 1903; the first wooden Post Office opened in 1902; the town before 1909 had a saddler, a blacksmith, a butcher, baker, etc but no candle stick maker.
All the major Christian faiths have been represented in Ceduna. The first church built in Ceduna was the Methodist in 1909 in Poynton Street. Its porched was added 1959 and the “new” church hall was added in 1962. The second church was the early Anglican Church also built in Poynton Street in 1911. It was last used for services in 1954 when the new St Michael’s and All Angels Church across the street opened. It was dedicated by the Bishop of Willochra in 1955 and the adjacent parish hall was built in 1981. The third church erected in town was the Lutheran Church in East Terrace. It was built in 1927 but was in a deteriorating condition by 1970. In 1971 it was demolished and a new Lutheran Church opened. Lutheranism was a strong faith in this region with the Koonibba Lutheran Aboriginal Mission (est. 1901) 39 kms out of town and the early Lutheran Church in Denial Bay 13 kms away which was the first church in the whole region built in 1897. In 1929 the Catholics built a church in Bergman Drive. It was dedicated as Our Lady Star of the Sea Catholic Church. A new parish hall was erected in 1977. Ceduna became its own Catholic parish with a resident priest in 1973 when it broke away from Streaky Bay.
Ayala Museum is an art and history museum located at the corner of Makati Avenue and Dela Rosa Street in Makati City, Metro Manila, the Philippines. As one of the most important private institutions on Philippine art and culture, Ayala Museum not only houses rare and priceless objects, but also protects and promotes the Philippines’ cultural and historical legacy, giving Filipinos a reason to be proud of their heritage—and giving the world a clear picture of who Filipinos really are, and what they can be.
Envisioned in the 1950s by Filipino abstract painter Fernando Zobel, the Ayala Museum was established in 1967 under the auspices of Ayala Foundation, Inc. It began as a museum of Philippine history and iconography, and transformed itself into a museum of fine arts and history as the 20th century drew to a close.
“Re-collecting the past, re-presenting the future” best describes the Ayala Museum’s dual role as a museum of history and of art. As a service to the nation the Museum works hard to bring home—“re-collect the past”—many of the country’s material treasures that have wound up in various parts of the world. This way, Filipinos who may have seen these priceless objects only in pictures, or who may not even be aware that they existed, will have the chance to view them up close, and in their homeland.
At the same time, the fact that there is a global village to which the Philippines belongs makes it necessary for Filipinos to be aware of what goes on in the world, especially in the area of art. This is how the Museum “re-presents the future” by making it clear that the contemporary Philippine art is a part of an international artistic community, where mutual cooperation and exchange are important.
Permanent Exhibitions
* The Diorama Experience — Sixty handcrafted dioramas form the core of Ayala Museum’s historical collections and chronicle the rich tapestry of Philippine history. The exhibition highlights major events and themes from prehistoric times to the recognition of Philippine independence by the United States in 1946. The exhibition culminates with People Power, a multimedia presentation that chronicles the events that led to the First EDSA People Power Revolution in 1986, including the tumultuous 1950s, the riotous martial law years, and the restoration of Philippine democracy by a new kind of uprising. Now, on the occasion 25th year anniversary of the assassination of exiled senator Benigno S. Aquino Jr. upon his return to his native land, the multimedia exhibition remains a significant visual testament to the Filipinos’ continuing quest to give meaning and substance to democracy and to the tragedy, challenges, optimism, and triumph of the times.
* Maritime Vessels — The museum also houses a one-of-a-kind boat gallery showcasing miniatures of the different watercrafts that plied the Philippine seas and contributed to the development of Philippine maritime trade and colonial economy.
* Pioneers of Philippine Art: Fernando Zobel — Fernando Zobel was born in Manila in 1924, the youngest child of Enrique Zobel de Ayala, patron of the artist Fernando Amorsolo. In contrast to Amorsolo's intuitive, childhood pre-occupation with drawing, it was as a young adult that Zobel made the conscious decision to become and artist. Zobel discovered that line—changes in its density, its angularity or softness, how it begins or ends—was capable of suggesting movement and a range of emotions analogous to those evoked by color. With the unconventional use of a hypodermic syringe he created a body of works, here exhibited, called Saetas, from a Spanish word meaning both "arrow" and a particular kind of Flamenco dance. Zobel's pioneering experimentation with creative transformations, traversing a wide interpretative range from mimesis to metamorphosis, spawned succeeding generations of abstract artists who today acknowledge his profound influence on their work.
* Gold of Ancestors — This exhibition of more than one thousand gold objects celebrates the sophisticated cultures that existed in the Philippines before colonization in the 16th century. Many of the precious objects here were recovered in association with 10th to 13th century Chinese export ceramics. Similarities in form and iconography with artifacts of other Southeast Asian cultures affirm regional affinities and inter-island contacts that flourished in these archipelagic crossroads of civilizations. Adornments of elite individuals and their deities include a spectacular array of golden sashes, necklaces, earrings and finger rings, bracelets, and anklets. Here, the role of archaeology in reconstructing the past is illuminated, demonstrating how funerary objects become valuable sources of information for subsequent generations of the living.
* Embroidered Multiples — The exhibition features selections from the Leiden National Museum of Ethnology’s collection of Philippine garments acquired from the French diplomat Bréjard, who served in Manila from 1881 to 1886. The collection includes rare, embroidered silk trousers or sayasaya worn by Philippine elite men, formerly known only through nineteenth-century watercolor images. Multiple examples of delicately embroidered nipis blouses provide a lexicon of decorative techniques including relief embroidery, calado openwork, and supplementary weft or suksuk, as well as the changing silhouette of women’s fashion. This unprecedented five-year loan of the Bréjard collection is enhanced by a generous ten-year loan from the private collection of Rina Ortiz, which includes heirloom garments formerly in the Pardo de Tavera collection.
* A Millennium of Contact — Chinese and Southeast Asian ceramics found in the Philippines tell the story of how the country forged social and commercial ties with China and its neighbors. This display of more than 500 ceramics provides one of the most comprehensive surveys of Chinese and Southeast Asian trade wares found in the Philippines, spanning a thousand years. These trade ceramics not only serve as a feast for the eyes, but their origins and the periods in which they were produced also provide important data about the past. Proofs of the lively trade that occurred between China and Southeast Asia, these pieces continue to play an important role in the understanding of Philippine history.
It was born as a military aircraft, enjoyed a second career as a firefighting plane and is settling into its golden years as a piece of public art after a close call with the scrap heap.
"Grumman Greenhouse" is a decommissioned military plane that was being sold for scrap in Alabama when 27-year-old artist Jordan Griska purchased it with a more noble fate in mind. Its new home is next door to his alma mater, the Pennsylvania Academy of the Fine Arts, in a new plaza it shares with some pretty weighty company: Claes Oldenburg's massive illuminated paintbrush.
The Grumman S2F Tracker was an anti-submarine aircraft flown by the Navy between 1954 and 1976. Griska's plane spent its post-military life in California as a firefighting plane until it was retired and ended up on eBay earlier this year. Griska was the sole bidder.
"It's $40,000 to install it — that's something like an eighth of what I paid for the plane," Griska said during a break Tuesday in the installation, a delicate operation involving a crane, ropes, ladders and nearly a dozen workers painstakingly reassembling the craft in its outdoor location. "I spent more on rivets than it cost to buy the plane."
Placed on a low platform nose-first, tail in the air, the 18,000-pound plane looks more like it tripped and fell than crash-landed. It is intact but reconfigured, like origami, with its nose and belly being fashioned into greenhouses that will yield seasonal herbs, vegetables and flowers year-round.
"To me, the piece is about ... the global tensions we live in, themes of war and peace and concerns about global sustainability," PAFA president David Brigham said, "and Jordan has brought them together in a very interesting way."
After a panel of PAFA faculty suggested Griska for the job, he returned with the proposal for "Grumman Greenhouse." The school provided an undisclosed amount of funding, described as an honorarium, and the artist did fundraising of his own for the project.
"I wanted a military aircraft for its scale and history and this came up," he said. "It was great timing."
Griska worked on "Grumman Greenhouse" for around six months in his West Philadelphia studio. It is so far his largest work. The 2008 PAFA graduate's earlier projects include reconfigured newspaper honor boxes, a 1960s gas pump crumpled accordion-like and a fanciful submarine repurposed from propane tanks.
The plane arrived from Alabama in pieces and with missing and damaged parts. After consultation with military and civilian pilots and enthusiasts, the white-painted Grumman was sanded to its silver base by a team of volunteers, its numbers and other distinguishing characteristics left intact to preserve its past, and lost pieces were donated or replicated.
In a nod to the plane's former job with the California Department of Forestry, Griska asked local firefighters to help with the artwork's installation, which was rain-delayed for two weeks. The "greenhouse" ingredients are courtesy of the Pennsylvania Horticultural Society and the edible yields will be distributed to needy families through the City Harvest program.
The face-down orientation already has caused some consternation among a few former Navy pilots and aircraft aficionados who saw photographs of the work in progress and suggested "Grumman Greenhouse" was disrespectful of the craft's history and the veterans who flew it.
Griska did not build the piece to resemble a crash. He knew such interpretation was inevitable but said once people see the sculpture in place, they'll understand.
He said the plane's posture, consistent with his characteristic retrofitting of familiar objects, is partly due to space restrictions of an 18-foot-wide platform at the corner of a narrow plaza between two buildings. However, he did give thought to the connotation, asking himself how the aftermath of a tragic event could be used for a positive purpose by future generations.
Along with the serious statements it offers, the work also conveys a sense of playfulness and the plants suggest the optimism of new life and growth. Its future as a work of public art means the Grumman will be enjoyed and appreciated instead of being scrapped and torn apart, Griska said.
A plaque to be installed at the base of the plane includes a quote by retired Marine Gen. Peter Pace, a former joint chiefs chairman, honoring the Grumman's past service in times of peace and war and its future "to inspire and support this community, feeding those in need, and encouraging future artists."
Unlike Oldenburg's permanent "Paint Torch," Griska's work will remain in the plaza for about a year. It is the successful first edition of what will be a series of rotating exhibitions by established and emerging artists, Brigham said.
"He has taken found object sculpture to a new level," Brigham said. "It exceeds our expectations."
Digital image taken with a Lumix GX7 fronted with an Olympus Zuko Digital 25mm f/1.8 lens
Editing done via Photoshop Elemtnts 12 with Topaz Labs plug-ins
Found and admired at the 2018 ALL FORD SHOW at the Pundmann Ford Dealership in St. Charles, Missouri, USA
"The glass may be half empty, but at least it's half full, right?"
Way too nice of a person. Didn't ask for anything but a smile, despite the rainy PNW weather.
"Choosing to be positive and having a grateful attitude is going to determine how you're going to live your life."
~ Joel Osteen
Distraction from the terrible out there
1. yard fence sign
2, 3. Wisdom from the littles
4. bicycle friendly coffee house
الأمل هو شعور عاطفي يتفاؤل به الإنسان ويرجو فيه نتائج إيجابية لحوادث الدهر أو تقلباته حتى وإن كانت تلكم النتائج الإيجابية صعبة أو مستحيلة الحدوث.
الطموح هو إمتلاك الحافزِ لبلوغ القوَّة. يُريد الأشخاص الطموحون دائماً القوَّة أمّا لأنفسهم أَو للآخرين بغرض النظر عن إذا ماكانت القوة نفسية أو ماديّة أو سلطوية أو عاطفية أو اجتماعية.
التفاؤل هي وجهة نظر في الحياة و التي تبقي الشخص ينظر إلى العالم كمكان إيجابي، أَو تبقي حالته الشخصية إيجابية. و التفاؤل هو النظير الفلسفي للتشاؤم. المتفائلون عموماً يَعتقدون بأنّ الناس والأحداث جيدة أصلاً، و أكثر الحالات تسير في النهاية نحو الأفضل.
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Hope is a belief in a positive outcome related to events and circumstances in one's life. Hope is the feeling that what is wanted can be had or that events will turn out for the best.
Ambition is the desire for personal achievement. Ambitious persons seek to be the best at what they choose to do for attainment, power, or superiority. Ambition is also the object of this desire.
Optimism is "an inclination to put the most favorable construction upon actions and events or to anticipate the best possible outcome".Optimists generally believe that people and events are inherently good, so that most situations work out in the end for the best.
Resources
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Taken from the WORLDWIDE PHOTO WALK 2009
Please ,, if you add comment, add it with out any PIC =S
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BASTROP, Texas – Despite earlier optimism, Texas Parks and Wildlife Department firefighters and other personnel were still facing a fire threat to historic structures at Bastrop State Park today.
According to TPWD incident commander Robert Crossman, all but about 100 acres of the 6,000-acre park have been blackened by fire, but firefighters have so far been able to save most of the Civilian Conservation Corps-constructed structures on the park, with two possible exceptions – two CCC observation structures believed to have been damaged. Chase A. Fountain / TPWD ©2011.
"Clouds come floating into my life, no longer to carry rain or usher storm, but to add color to my sunset sky." Rabindranath Tagore
An intimate corner of the Librarian of Congress’s private office reveals the richness of the institution's design ethos, where architecture, symbolism, and craftsmanship converge. Photographed inside the Thomas Jefferson Building in Washington, D.C., this image captures not only a striking view of the custom-carved oak paneling and cabinetry but also a glimpse into the layers of artistry that define America’s oldest cultural federal institution.
The focal point is a finely crafted wooden door embedded with intricate geometric panel designs, emblematic of Gilded Age attention to craftsmanship. Slightly ajar, the door gives way to a bookcase filled with worn, leather-bound volumes, reinforcing the room’s scholarly purpose. The wall-mounted shelves, part of the millwork, seamlessly blend into the architecture—this is not simply a room with books, but a room made for books. It’s a subtle reminder that the Library of Congress exists as both a working institution and a temple of knowledge.
To the left, the vivid blue flag of the Library of Congress adds a pop of color and institutional identity. Emblazoned with the seal of the library, it reinforces the photo’s location while symbolizing the federal mandate to preserve and protect the intellectual and cultural output of the nation. The deep cobalt contrasts beautifully with the surrounding warm tones of oak and the floral pattern of the wool rug beneath.
Above the door, a hand-painted mural forms part of the elaborate ceiling spandrels. Its verdant green background and golden botanical motifs evoke mythological and symbolic themes that echo throughout the Jefferson Building. This ceiling detail, like others in the library, draws inspiration from Renaissance libraries and European academic institutions, filtered through an American lens of optimism and Enlightenment values.
In the foreground, a graceful cream-colored settee upholstered in a damask pattern provides a humanizing touch—this is a working space, but also a space of comfort and diplomacy. The sinuous curve of the furniture balances the angularity of the door and shelving, creating a pleasing dialogue between soft and hard elements. The quiet symmetry and control of this composition suggest an interior that is deeply intentional, where no detail is left to chance.
This corner of the Librarian’s office is not publicly accessible, making the image a privileged view into the workings of American cultural leadership. It underscores how space can embody institutional memory and intellectual authority. More than just a workplace, this room—and this corner in particular—serves as a reflection of a mission rooted in scholarship, stewardship, and elegance.
Nikon F80 + Nikkor 18-35mm f/3.5-4.5 + Fuji Pro 800Z (Rubbish supermarket scan!)
Will scan decent copies of some of these for myself in due course...
Brookside Gardens, Maryland
For image licensing or prints, please contact.
Portfolio: brianedenphotography.com/
Original Photography Apparel: shutterandgrind.com/
[...] A pessimist only sees the dark side of the clouds, and mopes; a philosopher sees both sides and shrugs; an optimist doesn't see the clouds at all--he's walking on them [...]
-- Quote by Leonard L. Levinson
Nikon D70, Tokina 28-70 f/2.8, 44mm - f/10 - 1/40s - HDR 3xp +2/-2EV - Cokin gradual dark tobacco optical filter
Petrella Salto, Italy (June, 2010)
ooooooooops way too much to drink ;-)
one of the best things that happened to me on this island !
saved poor little me's reputation a couple of times
best drinking buddy
best partying buddy
sweetest guy in the whole world
i will seriously miss you !!!
Uploaded for the December Diary 2012 group which is asking for 'favourite things'.
Optimism should maybe be one of everyone's favourite things,
is seeing the glass half-full, even if it isn't!
After last night's indulgence "shot" , a cold glass of water helps to awaken the senses and speed up the return to normalcy! Here's to a great weekend, friends!
Canon EF 85mm @ f/1.8