Category: Travel, Art & Photography
Quote of the Day – Travel
“To move, to breathe, to fly, to float,
— Hans Christian Andersen
To gain all while you give,
To roam the roads of lands remote,
To travel is to live.”
Cat Devouring a Bird by Pablo Picasso
When I look at my cat I see a cute, cuddly, adorable creature. When birds and small mammals look at cats, they probably see something like this nightmarish vision from Picasso’s 1939 painting, likely inspired by the violence of the Spanish Civil War.
It seems that Picasso wasn’t a big fan of the pampered domestic fluff balls:
I hate pure-bred cats that purr on the pillow in the living room. I like feral cats that hunt birds, scamper around the streets like crazy, drag everything they get. They look at you with wild eyes ready to scratch your face.
Top Ten Tuesday – Books Set in a Place I’d Love to Visit
I’ve really looked forward to this topic on the That Artsy Reader Girl, since it combines my two great loves, reading and travel. Some of the places on my list exist only in imagination and will always remain out of reach… but one can always dream! I probably could have filled the entire list with nothing but fantasy and sci-fi, however I tried to keep it mostly grounded in this reality.
The Bachelor Party Except Everyone is a Cat
Louis Wain (1860 – 1939) was an English artist famous for the thousands of sketches and paintings of cats displaying human behaviour. They enchanted the Victorians who were more likely to see cats as a mildly irritating tool of pest control. Some of his art is too saccharine and cutesy for my liking, but I love this painting in which a feline bachelor party is clearly approaching an advanced stage of debauchery. I bet there’s catnip in those cigars!
Book Covers with Cats – The Master and Margarita
When I was compiling the most recent Top Ten Tuesday list dedicated to books with cats on the cover, I realised that I could have simply filled it with covers of Mikhail Bulgakov’s classic, The Master and Margarita, since there were so many of them.
It seems that designers and illustrators just can’t resist Behemoth, the enormous demonic black cat who accompanies Satan on his visit to 1930s Moscow – and who can blame them? He is certainly my favourite fictional feline and makes for a great cover image. Here are some of the book covers I found.
Tasmania East Coast
I spent the Anzac Day long weekend across the Bass Strait, in one of my favourite holiday destinations.
The Australian Garden
The Australian Garden, situated in Cranbourne’s Royal Botanic Gardens, must be one of Melbourne’s best kept secrets. It’s a long way away from the CBD and I wouldn’t think that it’s on the radar of most tourists, unless they come on some kind of organised garden-oriented tour. As for me, I’ve been driving past it pretty much every year on the way to Phillip Island, thinking that we should really make an effort to see it one day. After finally visiting last year, we were impressed enough to come back for another stroll.
The Australian Garden is all about celebrating the native Australian plants and landscapes, with plenty of photo opportunities. It doesn’t waste time and sets out to impress just as you walk in, with its most spectacular Red Sand Garden. Just like the last time, I wished I had a jet pack to get an aerial view of this stunning spot.
This is no pretty manicured garden, but it blends nature, art and architecture in its own unique and beautiful way, with exhibition gardens, waterways and imaginative displays inspired by the natural cycles. It was wonderful to visit again on a Sunday morning, before it became too hot and crowded.
Phillip Island and Cape Woolamai
I’ve been to Phillip Island almost every year for the last 26 years, and never knew that this beautiful nook existed.
Hampton Beach 2 Brighton Beach
Six Melbourne lockdowns later, there’s finally a cautious hope that The Most Locked Down City in the World is putting those times behind it. So to mark the occasion of eased restrictions, I thought I’d do a photo tribute to my favourite beach walk that helped me keep my sanity in 2020 and 2021.
If there’s any silver lining to the Covid era, it’s the fact that it got me walking outside in almost any weather, on an almost daily basis. There are a few nice parks and green areas around where I live, but nothing has done more for my mental health during lockdown than a brisk walk by the beach, and a chance to look out on that infinite horizon, breathe in the salty air and feel less boxed in. I loved watching the beach change from day to day, and couldn’t resist taking photos.
One of the most pleasant things about this walk is getting rewarded with a view of the city and the famous colourful Brighton Beach cabins from the top of a small hill; on occasions I would extend the walk and check them out.
yggdrasille.com 