Australian Art Piece #2

We arrived in Cairns late in the evening of September 10 and hadn’t really had dinner so we asked the guy at the front desk of our hotel if there was anything nearby. He pointed us to a strip mall about 2 blocks away. We surveyed the options, which were not many. We walked the extra block to an Indian restaurant which was just closing. Our choices were then limited to a convenience store and Pizza Hut take away. We ordered a large pizza for $11 and took it back to our hotel room. It was the best and cheapest pizza we’ve had since coming to Australia. That is to say, we haven’t had very good pizza here.

Our first morning in Cairns we explored the boardwalk and the downtown center. We discovered that instead of a beach there was a broad tidal mud marsh. As this was home to numerous shore birds and crustaceans scurrying about, we were soon engrossed in its primal beauty.

We happened across the Regional Art Gallery that someone had mentioned to us. It had three exhibits, two of which featured aboriginal artists. One of the indigenous artists specialized in intricate headdresses made from wood and cut feathers. The other artist, Roy McIvor, had colorful and whimsical art pieces, many of which featured friendly but mischievous spirits called dunggans. “Dunggans are from the spirit world. At times they come down into this world, they visit waterholes and lagoons, making merry, paddling canoes, laughing and screaming with joy and diving for fresh water mussels. Whenever people come nearby, talking or making noise the Dunggans would disappear." We watched a video of a local printmaker who helped Roy to reproduce his prints and heard Roy tell his own story which you can read more about here and here.

Ann liked that he was inspired by a teacher to continue with his art. We weren’t allowed to take pictures in the gallery, but we bought a greeting card with Roy McIvor’s work. When we expressed disappointment that there weren’t more cards with his work, the clerk mentioned that we could find some of his work for sale at Canopy Artspace downtown. 

The greeting card

When we left the gallery, we made our way toward Canopy to see any of Roy’s works that might be for sale and in our price range. There was a whole room of original paintings and prints. We both really liked the spirits and so we settled on this block print, our second Australian art purchase. It’s called Dungal (Bush Spirits).

 
While at Canopy, we met the print maker, Theo, with whom Roy makes his prints. As we chatted with Theo, we learned that he’s a transplant from Boston. 
 

Printmaking facilities

Theo on the left, as we discussed our purchase and baseball

Somehow the conversation turned to baseball and the Red Sox. Theo told us Cairns had a baseball league and he played on one of the teams. He mentioned that they would be playing on Sunday and we, of course, said we’d love to come watch. You can read all about our day of baseball in a future post.