Lane Walking: Weekes Lane, Newtown

Looking at the bright clear light in these pictures it seems almost impossible that I only took these last month. I heard someone on the tv say that we've had 8 days of rain in the past 10 days. Really? Only 8? Blech, Winter I am over you already. Thankfully the Winter Solstice was a few days back and now it means we are on the gentle climb towards Spring.

Anyhoo, Weekes Lane. I love Weekes Lane! One of my friend's has a back garden courtyard and back gate that opens onto Weekes Lane, and the first time I visited I realised that Weekes Lane was something special. A bit of an art gallery of street art that is frequently changed and renewed. I have even seen guided tours of the lane during Sydney festival events. Some of the works I shot have gone already, been defaced or painted over.

But that is entirely the nature of the art. And one of the reasons I find it so exciting!

For me photographing these is a way of ensuring that when they are painted over or defaced, they can live on in my archives. With my memories of a bright sunny afternoon wandering with my camera.

[Click to see them full sized on Flickr.]

An Enduring Love Affair

I have a long and enduring love affair with my neighbourhood of Newtown. I appreciate it in Autumn, and I mostly have a fondness for it in Winter, but when Spring and Summer roll around I think I fall in love with it a little bit more every year. Once the days get longer, the parks full of people later into the early evening, and the percentage of beautiful cloudless days increases, I just enjoying being in my neighbourhood. I hope I capture a little bit of how I feel about where I live when I post pictures here.

I spotted these gold pumps mounted high up on the side wall of a house on the way home this afternoon. Tucked away in a little side street, they're a bit of silliness and surprise that made me laugh out loud.

Most of my neighbourhood is quite high density living, full of old workers' cottages and narrow terrace houses, and while we could probably be a little bit more actively friendly with each other, everyone in my end of my long narrow street gets along and generally leaves each other alone. (Bin thief or two excepted.) Some of my favourite residents are the street full of friendly pusses. It can take me double the time to walk up my street if they are all out and ready to be paid their due. From the demanding ginger tom that starts yelling for a pat when I'm still two houses away, to the inscrutable Burmese that accepts but never seeks scritches.

Beautiful morning light and a luminous bloom growing through a fence near my house.

It's not all about the felines. A few blocks from home there is a big park where dogs are allowed to romp off the lead. In the morning and in the dusk of late afternoon you'll find groups of people from old Greek grans, to inner-urban Goths and hipsters, and of course lots of The Gays, standing around chatting while a large well natured pack of pups of all shapes and sizes chase each other and any ball that's being thrown.

A fantastic vintage Dodge truck I passed in the street last weekend. I didn't spot the driver, but I'm picturing a white tee with some Malboros tucked in the arm. Wishful thinking maybe

I've talked about the diversity of my neighbourhood before, but I think that's one of the strengths. The uni students, old residents that have lived here forever, and the vegan right-on sisterhood (and brotherhood) stop it from getting too precious, while The Gays (of which we are many) and the young families bring special flavours and colours of our own. The cafes are good, the shopping likewise, there are chi chi and grungy pubs... in a word, variety.

Some rear laneway street art I chanced upon last weekend.

It's a good fit for me. I like the peaceful part of the street I live in, while less than 10 minutes away there are cafes, restaurants, funky shops and bookstores open late into the night. Pretty much what I had hoped for when I moved from sleepy old Adelaide all those years ago. It just took me a while to find but, but now I'm here I'm in no rush to ever move... ever!

Urban Archeology

I had an hour to kill this morning, between Haircut Day and meeting the weary traveller* for brunch. What to do on an unseasonably hot Spring day (ie: 33C, or over 90F in old money) in Newtown? Answer - wander, take photos, dash from shady patch to shady patch lest the skin that hasn't seen daylight in lo, months, burn to a crisp.

Bows to present, some colours and textures from the back lanes of Newtown.

I love the kind of sun bleached look in these pics. Can you feel the heat rising from the footpath? The fierce sun beating down? Next time it's cold I'm going to go and look at these pics again, and think about stalking the lanes of Newtown, working up a sweat and thinking that I should have worn sunscreen.

* Jet-lagged, and frankly given my current state of wanderlust, I'm struggling to find sympathy.

Lane Walking: Gibbens Lane

I thought it might be fun to start a little semi-regular photography project, exploring the myriad of laneways around Newtown and Camperdown with my camera.

I don't claim any real originality to this idea, other bloggers have done this sort of project before me. In fact I remember once finding an Adelaide blogger whose blog was devoted entirely to the idea of documenting the lanes and alleys of Adelaide. (I don't know if this blog is still going, I've since lost the url a long time ago. If anyone knows of it hit me up in the comments and I'll add in a linky dink.)

My house is right on the border of two inner west Sydney city suburbs, Newtown and Camperdown. Both of them have a long and colourful history, and for many decades were cramped low rent suburbs filled with worker housing, and not terribly well serviced with sanitation. Behind almost every street there are parrallel laneways, where the 'night soil' sanitation workers would collect the toilet pans from the 'out houses' at the bottom of every garden.

That's a long time ago now, and these inner city suburbs of narrow terrace houses and cottages are now considered desirable places to live, rather than the borderline slums they were. But the laneways remain. Mostly now they are filled with people's garbage bins, the odd discarded sofa or ironing board, and prowling domestic cats. But sometimes these semi-private spaces are also home to odd and interesting things, funky grafitti and bits of self expression.

The other day I discovered Gibbens Lane in Camperdown. Unlike most of the lanes Gibbens Lane has a few twists and turns and instead of just the mostly non-descript rear fences of residences it also has a couple of warehouse type buildings mixed in.

But then I turned the corner and unexpectedly found a cool street art project by someone called "Madame Kafoops" (who I discovered has a Flickr photostream of their own.) These burlesque styled paste ups of a woman in various outfits and poses are almost life sized.

Cool, huh? Over the years I've photographed other odds and ends that I have found in the laneways, but this was one of the more surprising discoveries. And it was mostly this that kicked off the idea that I should maybe explore more. To try and use this as an exercise to find the interesting in what can generally be pretty bland spaces. To try and look at these neglected and infrequently visited spaces with fresh eyes.

[Click the pics to see them full sized on Flickr.]