indigenous

Sunday Studio Visit – Re-Visiting The Olgas

There’s not alot going on in the studio today – I am firing the kiln with mostly student works, playing with some new button jewellery designs and planning my next day of throwing…. what I’ll be making and stuff like that – I am planning this day to be Tuesday… best laid plans!

I am also going through some pics from my recent trip to Darwin, via Alice Springs on the Ghan. So far I have shared some SUNSET images and KATHERINE GORGE images…. today I will share some images from The Olgas. Kata Tjuta, also known as The Olgas, are a group of large domed rock formations located about 365 km southwest of Alice Springs, in the southern part of the Northern Territory, central Australia… more can be read about them HERE.

I have also written a poem and drawing inspired by The Olgos which you check out on my POETRY blog.

Here are some pics…. have a great Sunday 🙂

Sunday Studio Visit – Photography and the Katherine Gorge

Photography and the Katherine Gorge and the Weekly WordPress Photo Challenge

I am not doing much in the ceramics studio today…. it has been a busy weekend of friends birthday parties and engagement parties – so I am hoping to get into the studio tomorrow.

In the meantime I thought it would be  good opportunity to work on some photography catch-up and go through the pics from my recent travels to the Northern Territory. As regular readers may know I traveled through the Northern Territory recently with my mum and sisters on The Ghan with stopovers along the way – you can see a previous post HERE.

So for today’s studio visit I thought I’d share pics of the Katherine Gorge and relate them to the WordPress Weekly Photo Challenge : Intricate – which is about line and pattern.

For me line and pattern is not just about Golden Mean type geometry, but also Natural Geometry, or what call Sacred Geometry,  which  mirrors the organic nature of our universe, which I have expressed previously in posts such as this ONE.

So, it seems obvious that I would share an image from my experience of the Katherine Gorge for this challenge.

The gorges and the surrounding landscape are owned by the local Jawoyn people, who are custodians of Nitmiluk National Park, and manage it in conjunction with the Northern Territory National Parks body. In Jawoyn, Nitmiluk means “place of the cicada dreaming” and if you visit at the right time of the year you’d know what this meant via your ears! All of the boat tour services are owned by the local indigenous people who share their knowledge of the gorge and history (where appropriate) and some funny stories too!

Katherine Gorge is a deep gorge carved through ancient sandstone by the Katherine River and is made up of thirteen gorges. During the dry season the Katherine Gorge waters are calm and ideal for swimming and canoeing. There may be freshwater crocodiles in the river, as they nest along the banks, but they are harmless to humans. As my partner said, during a previous visit he made the the gorge – they just nibble your toes! However, Saltwater crocodiles regularly enter the river during the wet season, so swimming at this time is not a good idea! We visited the gorge only weeks after the waters had lowered, so were lucky enough to be able to do the river cruise.

We were able to visit the gorge as The Ghan did a stopover between Alice Springs and Darwin with a variety of activities “trainees” could do – we picked the gorge.

It was an amazing experience…. the views were breathtaking and the commentary on the boat tour was delivered by a local indigenous person who knew lots of local history tainted with a bit of funny colour!

So my pic for the challenge is this one…. and following that is a gallery of images taken at the gorge showing more images of Nature’s amazing line and pattern – if you haven’t ever visited the gorge, it is well worth the trip 🙂

In response to The Daily Post’s weekly photo challenge: “Intricate.”