The Adelaide Review - June Edition

Page 1

THE Adelaide

REVIEW Issue 412 June 2014

adelaidereview.com.au

Dorrit Black The importance and influence of Dorrit Black will be showcased with a retrospective at the Art Gallery

30

Budget 2014

Hanuman

Smart by Design

A budget crisis has been manufactured to drive a conservative policy agenda, writes John Spoehr

Paul Wood reviews Jimmy Shu’s contribution to Adelaide’s dining scene, Hanuman

Leanne Amodeo checks out UniSA’s anticipated new learning centre, the Jeffrey Smart Building

06

40

52


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4 The Adelaide Review June 2014

WELCOME

TheAdelaideReview

ISSUE 412

AdelaideReview

editor David Knight davidknight@adelaidereview.com.au Digital Manager Jess Bayly jessbayly@adelaidereview.com.au

44

ART DIRECTOR Sabas Renteria sabas@adelaidereview.com.au ADMINISTRATION & DISTRIBUTION Kate Mickan katemickan@adelaidereview.com.au

Hot 100 SA Wines

NATIONAL SALES AND MARKETING MANAGER Tamrah Petruzzelli tamrah@adelaidereview.com.au ADVERTISING EXECUTIVES Tiffany Venning Michelle Pavelic advertising@adelaidereview.com.au

We introduce our judges for the 2014 Hot 100 SA Wines wine show and publication, which features our new Chief Judge, Banjo Harris Plane

INSIDE Features 05 Business 06 Columnists 08

MANAGING DIRECTOR Manuel Ortigosa

Publisher The Adelaide Review Pty Ltd, Level 8, Franklin House 33 Franklin St Adelaide SA 5000. GPO Box 651, Adelaide SA 5001. P: (08) 7129 1060 F: (08) 8410 2822. adelaidereview.com.au

Finance 10 Circulation CAB. Audited average monthly, circulation: 28,648 (April 12 – March 13) 0815-5992 Print Post. Approved PPNo. 531610/007

Disclaimer Opinions published in this paper are not necessarily those of the editor nor the publisher. All material subject to copyright. This publication is printed on 100% Australian made Norstar, containing 20% recycled fibre. All wood fibre used in this paper originates from sustainably managed forest resources or waste resources.

THE ADELAIDE

review

Fashion 18 Books 21

23

50

Travel 38

Paul Capsis

SA Architect Awards

Food. Wine. Coffee 39

Cabaret Festival favourite Paul Capsis discusses his role in the anticipated production of Little Bird

Voting for the South Australian Architect Awards’ People Choice Awards will open soon

Performing Arts 22 Visual Arts 30

FORM 49

COVER CREDIT: Dorrit Black, Australia, 1891-1951, The double basses, c.1950, Magill, Adelaide, oil on canvas, 61.0 × 40.5 cm.

Contributors. Leanne Amodeo, D.M. Bradley, John Bridgland, Michael Browne, Tish Custance, Stephen Forbes, Andrea Frost, Charles Gent, Roger Hainsworth, Andrew Hunter, Jane Llewellyn, Kris Lloyd, John Neylon, Nigel Randall, Christopher Sanders, John Spoehr, Shirley Stott Despoja, David Sornig, Graham Strahle, Ilona Wallace, Matt Wallace, Paul Wood. Photographer. Jonathan van der Knaap

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THE ADELAIDE REVIEW JUNE 2014 5

FEATURE going to Loxton.’ It turned out to be a crazy couple of weeks at the age of 14, when I had to leave all my family, friends and everybody behind. The hell period lasted for about a year and after that it turned into an amazing experience.”

Anne Wiberg

OFF TOPIC:

ANNE WIBERG Off Topic and on the record, as Adelaide identities talk about whatever they want... except their day job. Anne Wiberg – Chair of MusicSA, Adelaide Festival Associate Producer and DJ – moved from Helsinki to country South Australia on her 14th birthday back in 1977. It took a while for Wiberg to appreciate this particular birthday surprise. BY DAVID KNIGHT

If I ever write a biography it’s going to be called Helsinki to Hell,” Wiberg begins. “Partly because it was minus-25 degrees the day we left and two days later in Adelaide it was 35 degrees. This was the middle of February on my 14th birthday. So, of course, I hated my family

The catalyst for Wiberg’s Australian move was when her mother became pen friends with a Finnish man living in Loxton. “My mum was a single parent for five years and as a joke decided to become pen friends with a Finnish man who was living in Australia. It started by, ‘Okay I’ll just start writing to this man’. Anyway, he came to visit my mum, my sister and I in Helsinki and the day they met they got engaged. They were married within four weeks, and six weeks later we were living in Loxton. “There was no internet. The only way I could communicate with my family was aerograms, so they took three weeks to get to Finland and another three weeks to come back. It took at least four or five weeks to hear back and have that communication with your friends – very different now. My sister, who is two years younger than me, and I sort of looked after each other, but the isolation was the hardest.

for having me suffer on my birthday. “When we first arrived in Adelaide, I thought, ‘What is this place? It’s dusty, hot and horrible’. Then my new stepfather, who I’d known for six weeks, said ‘No, no we’re not staying here. We’re

“I’d decided that I would never ever stay in Australia, ‘I hate this place. The people are terrible. I can’t handle the weather’. The Australian government had a deal with the Finnish government in those days that if you stay in Australia for two

years you get permanent residency. So that was the minimum period. We were the last planeload from Helsinki to Australia – it was the last lot of Fins that came here on that deal. By the end of the two years we realised, ‘Hang on a minute, the two years is over and life is not too bad’.” Wiberg moved to Adelaide immediately after school but she says her Riverland experience taught her a lot. “Probably the most multicultural experience I ever had in my entire life was working in a pizza/ Chinese restaurant in Loxton. It was owned by a Chilean man, the chef was from Vietnam with a Finnish waitress in Loxton, South Australia. I thought, ‘Wow, I love that this can happen in a small country town. You can get all these different cultured people working together in a crazy restaurant environment. It taught me a lot. “The rest of my family has gone back to Finland. I stayed. I went back when I was 22. I lasted 15 months. I couldn’t wait to come back to Australia. So I moved here on my own. I had $200 in my pocket. I borrowed the money from my friends here to come back to Australia on a one-way ticket. I said goodbye to my family again. I went, ‘That’s it. I’ve got to stay here’.”

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6 The Adelaide Review June 2014

BUDGET 2014

Joe Hockey

Political Firestorm Unleashed by Budget by John Spoehr

T

he crisis we face in Australia is not a budgetary one but a moral one as the foundations of the Australian settlement come under attack. Austerity policies like those announced in the Federal Budget only serve to fuel rising inequality and generate great hardship for lowincome families and the unemployed.

Let’s be clear, a budget crisis has been manufactured to drive a radical conservative policy agenda, one that seeks to dismantle great institutions like our public health and education systems, which will be starved of the funds they need to ensure fair and decent outcomes for all Australians. In pushing policy to the extreme right in Australia we are

witnessing the declaration of the very type of policy war that the Coalition accused the former government of – class war.

loopholes in corporate tax and taxing windfall earnings from Australia’s mineral and energy resources.

There is no hiding from the reality that those who are harmed most by the Federal Budget are those who can least afford to be harmed. They are being damaged as part of a political strategy that seeks to propagate the lie that Australia is experiencing a Budget emergency. This is reprehensible politics divorced from fact.

Tax treatment of superannuation overwhelmingly favours high-income earners. You can get $200k in super income without paying any effective tax. Tax expenditures on super are around $32 billion at the moment and are set to rise to $45 billion by 2015-16. Concessions available to well-off retirees via super are estimated at around $27 billion. In the confected panic surrounding the aged pension (which costs around $41 billion) these costs are largely ignored. Maintaining the current arrangements for super saw wealthy retirees unaffected by the budget, but aged pensioners are estimated to lose up to 10 percent of their income.

Australia has a AAA credit rating. At just 12 percent of GDP, Australia has among the lowest public debt levels in the OECD where the average is around 70 percent. While unemployment has risen we have gone through a period of unbroken growth that is the envy of the western world. Without counter cyclical fiscal policy in response to the GFC we would have plunged into recession. In other words, we needed to increase our public debt in the wake of the GFC to stimulate the Australian economy. Other nations chose to starve their economies of public investment and paid a heavy price for doing so – double digit unemployment and economic stagnation. Part of the politics of the Federal Budget is to place pressure on the state and territories to argue for an increase in the GST. Beware the great tax swindle. The Coalition is trying to beat the states and territories into submission by cutting their health and education funding by $80 billion over the next decade. But, rather than capitulate to this fiscal thuggery, they have united to condemn the cuts and demand that the Coalition relent. There is a deep class bias in the Coalition’s tax and incomes policies. They are reducing corporate tax, abolishing the mining tax and cutting benefits to the poor. Meanwhile they are undermining the foundations of egalitarianism in the nation’s public health and education systems by imposing Medicare co-payments and de-regulating university fees. Forgotten is the need to reform perverse taxation arrangements that privilege the wealthy like abolition of negative gearing, getting rid of favourable tax treatment of high income earners’ superannuation, tightening

Clearly there are great inequities in operation in Australia’s taxation landscape, none of which would be improved by increasing or broadening the GST. While progressive tax reform is urgently needed this is not what the present Government has in mind. It seeks to reinforce the view that the GST is the main vehicle available to the states and territories to overcome deterioration in their revenues, a problem made worse by reductions in federal assistance. So far the Federal Budget has proved to be deeply unpopular, with the polls likely to dive for the Coalition in the months to come. They have ignited hundreds of policy flames that threaten a political firestorm and seem only to be adding further fuel to the fire. Just how much damage is done to the Coalition’s electoral prospects will become more evident over the months to come, as they are forced into deals to pass the budget through the Senate. The changes they propose so fundamentally undermine central tenets of the fair go, that they may well end up being mortally wounded by the scorching forces of nature that surround and threaten to envelop them.

»»Associate Professor John Spoehr is the Executive Director of the Australian Workplace Innovation and Social Research Centre at the University of Adelaide

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THE ADELAIDE REVIEW JUNE 2014 7

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BUDGET 2014 It is important to recall that it has been at least a decade since Australia has had any significant or sustained problem with economic growth, the cost of living, the budget or government debt. Indeed, the economy is into its 23rd year of continuous economic growth and Australians are amongst the richest people in the world with the unemployment rate one of the lowest. In the last couple of years, the Coalition parties under Abbott have trashed talked the economy with emotive and erroneous discussion about economic conditions. In doing so, Abbott and his cronies have achieved the ultimate reward, an election win, by suggesting things are grim with the economy ‘flatlining’, being ‘wiped out’, ‘in ruin’ and ‘a wreck’ and that Australia is confronting a budget emergency. Tony Abbott

Prepare for Government Economic Rhetoric Change Get set for a change in rhetoric from Prime Minister Tony Abbott and his government on the performance of the economy.

BY STEPHEN KOUKOULAS

I

n the weeks and months after the Budget, Abbott and his government are likely to flick the switch from ‘economic gloom, crisis and emergency’ to ‘sound, prudent economic management’. In doing so, it will be trying to sway public opinion towards giving his government the credit for what was

already a strong economy with triple-A-rated levels of government debt. In hard, macroeconomic terms, nothing much will have changed pre- and post-budget, it will just be the way Abbott characterises the economic information that changes.

Now having been in power for eight months and with Treasurer Hockey delivering his first budget, Abbott’s tactics have to change. Such is the imperative of the three-year election cycle that Abbott wants to use the months after the budget and then the period into 2015 to use the on-going favourable economic news as a platform for his 2016 election campaign. Abbott’s rhetoric is likely to be canvassed around the ‘tough’ decisions his government have taken up to and including the budget. Abbott will claim that his government has made those decisions to ‘fix the budget mess’ left by Labor. This rhetoric will probably coincide with further news of strength in the economy as consumer spending, housing construction and exports overtake mining investment as the engine of economic growth. It is a sound political tactic that, given the unquestioning nature of much of the population or the media, is likely to work. What will also be a vital aspect of the change in rhetoric is the natural improvement in the budget balance as the stronger economy delivers extra revenue and the measures taken in the budget trim spending. Indeed, by the time the 2015 budget rolls around, there should be little doubt that the budget is returning to surplus which will be political gold for the

Abbott government even though it will have had little to do with that achievement. While the government will cop some flack over some of the easy to critique decisions taken in recent months and in the budget, and will suffer criticisms from some of its unworkable environmental and social policy settings, going into the 2016 election with its message about a strong economy and a return to budget surplus will be hard to beat. The curious thing about all of this is that the hard facts on the economy and the budget will be little changed from those prevailing over the recent years when Abbott was lambasting the Labor Party for its economic and fiscal management. The facts will be remarkably similar to forecasts outlined by the previous government for the period 2014-15 and beyond. Over that time, GDP growth will be close to three percent, the unemployment rate will likely be five-point-something, inflation will almost certainly be in the two-to-three percent range and the level of government debt and return to budget surplus will be, more or less, the same as outlined under the policies of the Labor Party when the Pre- Election Fiscal Outlook was released during the election campaign in August 2013. All of which means that the Abbott government has, with the help of the Reserve Bank of Australia, a stronger global economy and a lower Australian dollar, maintained the broad momentum for the rate of economic growth that was in place before it was elected. In terms of fiscal policy, it will have merely maintained the cautious progress towards budget surplus and a reduction in government debt that the previous government was planning.

» Stephen Koukoulas is Managing Director of Market Economics marketeconomics.com.au

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8 THE ADELAIDE REVIEW JUNE 2014

BUDGET 2014

THIRD AGE Rage in our hearts: A Third Age response to the Budget BY SHIRLEY STOTT DESPOJA

I

t is the psychopathic model of a Budget.

Our feelings of apprehension were manipulated for weeks by a government without conscience and empathy: playing on the fears of those who have most to fear and all the while presenting the pain that was to come as in our best interests and the interest of the nation: anxiety-inducing manipulation of people for a government’s purpose. That’s psychopathy. The principals only let their guard down once, with the Gatsby-like picture of cigarsmoking, which for older people especially is an image redolent of plutocrats taking it easy and enjoying luxury at the expense of others. Some shocked Third Agers thought it should have caused riots, but by then people were so manipulated by anxiety that they took it for granted, even laughed at it a bit. Hollowly. If it was psychopathy before the Budget,

it was sophistry afterwards: denials that promises had been broken. Some interviewers, principally Sarah Ferguson on the ABC’s 7.30, did a fine job of exposing the sophistry. Others did less well. Government has messed with our heads. But the image that made the parliamentary setting for cigars, smoke and smiles seem like West Egg now reasserted itself as we learnt how smiling fiscal assassins would deny the young poor the means of getting out of bad life situations by affordable education and welfare support when needed, and set up the old to be resented, poor and without even the hope young people have despite life’s difficulties. I had hoped that there would be policies that would help prepare the nation for the ageing of the population, but I was not prepared for the idea of paying off employers to take on the old. Ten thousand for taking on a wrinkly? What an insult to the old with a lifetime of skills to offer their nation. There will be some phony job creation to get that $10k. Give the money to the older job seekers if you must flash it around. But the danger is in setting up the young against the old. Tony Abbott

We’ve seen it already. The more the young have to struggle to get education and the means of preparation for a future, the more they resent the old. The language describing the ageing

of the population is not cosy, not benign. It is the ‘tsunami’ of old people, an ‘avalanche’ of old people ‘draining’ the nation’s resources… And now the more the old have to struggle the less they can help the young. Volunteerism among the retired will disappear: volunteerism that holds up half the welfare sky for people in need, but is usually only mentioned when the Australian of the Year is chosen. Think of the hot meals brought to old people’s homes each day by volunteers themselves ageing. Think childcare by grandparents, which saves the nation as well as parents a bomb. These older people, these volunteers, will be job seekers. This budget is hard for young and old, but it is setting the generations against each other, making them feel they are competing for resources. Behind almost every insult to the aged is a feeling that the old have fewer rights and fewer needs. Why should he/she have a house or a computer while I haven’t? She/he doesn’t need them… Where are the initiatives we hoped to see for better lives for older people and a transition to a society with many more old people in it? The Council on the Ageing (COTA) spokesperson Ian Yates says: “Reducing pensioners’ living standards is a poor substitute for a comprehensive strategy for an ageing Australia.” And he questions lack of measures to provide retraining to older workers and flexible working arrangements. “The government will need to make these a priority long before the pension age rises.” But the rage in the hearts of Third Agers is especially directed at the Medicare changes.

Medicare was a great achievement of our time, of our prime. We feel ownership of this great safety net. We are as already sharply aware of gaps and attacks on bulk billing as we are of deficiencies in the Pharmaceutical Benefits Scheme (PBS). We are discomfited by seeing the old woman counting out her last dollars for her medications at the pharmacy counter. That’s happening now. It will be a lot worse if the changes are implemented. COTA says: “Out of pocket health expenses are already a barrier for older people to visit their doctor or take their medications and these new measures (in the Budget) will simply exacerbate the problem. This in turn will mean conditions which may have been easily treated in the early stage will worsen and put pressure on the more intensive and expensive end of the health care system – hospital care and surgery. “This initiative is counter intuitive.” COTA deplores the cut to the real growth in the Commonwealth Home Support program from 6 percent a year to 3.5 percent in 2018 and the argument put to justify it. In a long life, I have never hated a Budget so much, nor seen so many traps and dangers in a Budget for the quality and decency of life in my country. That’s without even mentioning cuts to foreign aid and other appalling things. Will pensioners use their heaters this winter? I suspect not. The answer to an ageing population should never be hypothermia.

@mollyfisher4


THE ADELAIDE REVIEW JUNE 2014 9

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SOCIALS CIVIL CONTRACTORS FEDERATION GALA DINNER On May 9, The Civil Contractors Federation SA celebrated 50 years with a gala dinner featuring more than 400 guests at the Adelaide Town Hall. Hall of Fame and Industry Excellence awards were presented with a night of exceptional entertainment from The Foenander Brothers and The Three Waiters.

Danny Parkinson, Paul Davison and Dominic Greco.

Sandy and Mal Wilkinson

Lyn Torbarina and Stefan Davies.

Rachael Taylor and Mel Simcock.

Jodie Bischoff and Anna Amorosa.

Cheryl Caufield and Amanda Boehm.

Âť TO SEE MORE SOCIAL IMAGES VISIT ADELAIDEREVIEW.COM.AU

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10 The Adelaide Review June 2014

FINANCE

It’s Tax Time With the Federal Budget now behind us, the end of the financial year is fast approaching and that means it’s time to get your tax affairs in order. by Michael Browne

W

hile your focus should be on wrapping up the current financial year there are a couple of changes announced in last month’s Federal Budget that you may need to factor in. These include the changes to the personal income tax rates under the Temporary Budget Repair Levy, the increase in the Medicare Levy arising from the National Insurance Disability Scheme and rephasing of the Superannuation Guarantee rate. In addition, the changed Fringe Benefit Tax rates which become effective on April 1, 2015, the reduction in company tax rates effective July 1, 2015 and the impact on larger corporate tax payers of the Paid Parental Leave initiative may also require thoughts as you wrap up the 2014 financial year.

The issues that need your attention before June 30, 2014 are a mix of basic and more technical matters and the list here is by no means comprehensive!

First, a couple of the basics, starting with bad debts. You need to ensure that any bad debts for which you expect to get a tax deduction have actually been written off before June 30. There must be evidence that the debt has been written off before year-end for it to be deductible. Another basic is ensuring that your superannuation contributions are actually paid before year-end and that means actually

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debited to your bank account. If that hasn’t occurred, you’re not entitled to the deduction, as the expense is considered not to have incurred. Of course there are numerous other basics that need to be attended to but these are just a couple that we often see our clients tripped up on. Then there are those more technical items

that generally need a discussion with your tax advisor. For privately owned business, key areas we talk most often to our clients about include, but are not limited to, planning issues associated with family trusts and private companies. The rules for family trusts are quite complex, regardless of whether the trust is for investment purposes or is carrying on a business. If you have a family trust you need to have determined


THE ADELAIDE REVIEW JUNE 2014 11

ADELAIDEREVIEW.COM.AU

FINANCE how the trust income will be distributed before year-end. The trustees need to ensure that their decision on the income distribution is evidenced before June 30, 2014, usually by way of a signed trustee minute. Most family trusts are discretionary trusts enabling a degree of flexibility in who will receive the income and what class of income they will receive – however the flexibility comes with a compliance obligation. The trustees should have regard to these different types of income as they make their determination whilst also considering the age of the beneficiaries, impact on Higher Education Loan Program (HELP) debts, Age Pension and other government-related payments. There’s more but these are just a start and proof that more time planning rather than less is best to get everything in order. It’s also important to remember that once a trust distribution is made, the money is actually the beneficiary’s, even if it is sitting in a loan account. This means the money is available to the beneficiary as and when they want it. This also means it is available to creditors, that it forms part of an estate and almost certainly a property settlement in the case of a divorce. Where the trustees propose to make a distribution to a company, ensuring all tax issues have been considered is vital. As a final comment on trusts, it is essential to ensure that

whatever the trustees do they comply with the requirements of the trust deed as it provides the governing rules. In the case of a private company there are some important issues to consider. Where the directors wish to declare a dividend in the current financial year it should be minuted before June 30, 2014. Paying a dividend might seem simple but ensuring that the requirements of the Corporations Act are met is fundamental before the dividend is paid. Also, from the recipient’s viewpoint, understanding whether the dividend will be fully or partially franked or unfranked before it is declared will be important as it has a direct bearing on their tax position. Another area that private companies need to be particularly mindful of is whether they have made loans to shareholders or associated persons, or have made assets available to shareholders. If so, they are likely caught by Division 7A of the Income Tax Assessment Act which has very specific requirements including the requirement for loans to have a loan agreement which must cover amongst other things, security position, term, interest obligations and minimum loan repayments. If you have a private company or family trust it is vital that you ensure that you have met

your obligations before the end of financial year, as failing to do so may mean you’re exposed to significant and quite onerous taxation consequences. The requirements are not straightforward and as such a discussion with your tax advisor helps to ensure you meet your obligations. On a personal level, don’t forget about getting your house in order. Whilst there are myriad issues to consider there are a couple that we regularly discuss with clients, including where you have loans that you intend to claim the interest as a tax deduction. In this case, the purpose of the loan must be one that meets the requirements of taxation law, for example a loan against a rental property. If the funds are used for a private purpose then the interest is not deductible. The test is focused on how you used the borrowed funds, and not the whether property that secures the loan is used to produce income. Ensuring that gifts and donations are made to charities that are registered as Deductible Gift recipients is the way to ensure that they are deductible. Our tax system is a self-assessment regime, which means the obligation is on the taxpayer to substantiate any claims they make. That means you need to have the relevant receipts and other appropriate evidence to support

save over

If you have a private company or family trust it is vital that you ensure that you have met your obligations before the end of financial year, as failing to do so may mean you’re exposed to significant and quite onerous taxation consequences”

all your claims not just some. Once you have done your year-end planning, allocate some time to look ahead to next year and plan for changes announced in the Federal Budget that will affect you and your business in the short and long term.

» Michael Browne is a Partner at PwC pwc.com.au

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12 The Adelaide Review June 2014

POLITICS Modern Times

Quest on Franklin

Equality of Power BY Andrew Hunter

T

he growing discontent over soaring inequality has risen to the surface of our national consciousness. Unless all citizens are given an equal voice in a democracy, governments will continue to produce public policy that increases the level of economic inequality. We appear to be moving inexorably towards a system that more closely resembles a plutocracy, rather than a true democracy. In February, Senator Arthur Sinodinos opined that in Australia today “…equality of opportunity should be our lodestar in creating a dynamic, innovative society that gets the best out of its people”. But equality of opportunity, let alone actual equality, will not be achieved unless our democracy offers genuine equality of power.

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Sinodinos was simultaneously an office-bearer in the NSW Branch of the Liberal Party and Chairman of Australian Water Holdings, a company from which the party attracted substantial political donations. As senator, Sinodinos had three undeclared directorships. Sinodinos would make a formidable exponent of kabuki theatre, where one actor plays multiple, often conflicted, roles. It would be naïve to think that such a scenario is conducive to politics that serve the national interest. Why have we waited so long to address this cancer within our democracy? We were perhaps taking our inspiration from the wrong source. America’s democracy is seen by many in Australia as the most relevant political system from which we can learn. In this context, it is worth considering the reality that this system produces. The results of a recent study conducted by the University of Princeton were not particularly surprising but the data rich analysis makes them particularly compelling.

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The report found that “economic elites and organised groups have substantial independent impacts on government policy, while average citizens of mass-based interest groups have little or no independent influence”. Recent events suggest that this problem may also be relevant to Australia. When mass-based interest groups have recently campaigned in direct opposition to the interests of economic elites on issues such as live animal exports and carbon pricing, they were ultimately unsuccessful in influencing political outcomes. The Princeton report demonstrated that a policy with low support (only supported by one in five) from the economic elite in America was adopted only 18 percent of the time. A proposed change with high support among the political elite was adopted 45 percent of the time. When the majority of citizens disagree with the economic elite, they lose. If a large majority of citizens desire a change that the economic elite are against, the

majority of citizens will lose. So long as elections are largely decided by the party with the greatest financial strength, vested interests in the private sector will continue to exert an unnecessary influence on our democracy. The level of campaign funding is crucial to the outcome of an election. Voters are today either time-poor or apathetic, happy to exist with the moronic gaze of the mass media and impervious to advertising’s constant din. Campaign funding allows a level of exposure in an election campaign that makes a huge difference to the outcome. Vested interests are further protected by a sophisticated network within the establishment that extends deep into government. The line that must separate our elected representatives with vested interests has become blurred and the influence of powerful interests groups is evident in the government’s social, economic and foreign policy. Early in the life of the current government, Assistant Health Minister Fiona Nash dismantled a food rating website designed to help consumers make healthy choices. At the time, her Chief of Staff was a principal shareholder in a food industry lobbying company. What chance do we have to address the nation’s obesity epidemic when the junk food industry can penetrate so easily into the decision-making apparatus of our democracy? With sufficient political will, true equality of power can be expressed through our democratic system. Campaign funding can be limited and made more transparent, expenditure in respective electoral campaigns can be capped, and legislation can be introduced to ensure that political office bearers cannot simultaneously have business interests that present a clear conflict – as was the case with Sinodinos and a great many others. High profile examples of systemic abuse have further diminished popular faith that our democratic system no longer serves our interests. Last year, Federal Labor and Liberal combined to limit the impact of changes to legislation on the disclosure of political donations. The success of Clive Palmer’s eponymous party at the recent Western Australian senate election has, ironically, persuaded both major parties that reform may well be necessary after all. Greater equality of power would simultaneously bring both competing traditions in Australian politics closer to their principal philosophical objectives. “If liberty and equality … are chiefly to be found in democracy,” wrote Aristotle, “they will be best attained when all persons alike share in government to the utmost.” To ensure that all Australians share in government to the utmost, we must ensure that vested interests cannot easily manipulate our policy process.

»»Andrew Hunter is Chair of the Australian Fabians fabians.org.au



14 THE ADELAIDE REVIEW JUNE 2014

MONTEFIORE Koutsantonis and his budget challenges. He’d have to recalculate anticipated revenues from the proposed city parking tax given the loss of the parking spaces. State budget talks are now grinding forward but somewhere in a bottom drawer he’s already found $3 million to throw into the mix, while the Anzac Centenary Fund is claimed to be throwing in $5 million. Suddenly it’s raining money. Details of the project were recently presented to Town Hall by Renewal SA CEO Fred Hansen and GM Richard McLachlan. But now that Hansen is no longer CEO and is homewardbound to the US, somewhere deep in the bowels of Renewal SA a new Anzac Centenary Memorial Garden Walk champion is preparing to run with the concept plan baton. Courageous.

MONTEFIORE It’s all quiet on the western front as Adelaide’s most significant 1840s city garden domain gets set to share space for a commemoration of war. BY SIR MONTEFIORE SCUTTLEBUTT

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delaide’s state-devised plan to widen Kintore Avenue, city, to create an Anzac Centenary Memorial Garden Walk, is quietly galvanising bureaucrats at all levels – the Weatherill government, the ANZAC industry and Town Hall. To commemorate the Anzac centenary in April 2015, that looming date appears to have set a cracking agenda. A few weeks ago at Town Hall, administrators struggling under very tight financial pressures had to find $1 million during its traditional ‘warfare-in-the-trenches’ budget wrangling, when every dollar counts. But that’s only half of what the government has decided Town Hall shall contribute and if the bean counters’ noses are out of joint, that’s just the beginning of the political complexities arising.

Firstly, the Government House domain would lose a long slice of its historic garden when its eastern perimeter wall is shifted west to make way for a walking boulevard down Kintore to Torrens Parade Ground. The concept would, for the first time since 1840, when Colonel Light set the site aside, diminish one of Adelaide’s most culturally significant city landmarks. The mansion was registered on the National Estate in 1978 and the domain was subject to recommendations in 2004 that its gardens also be recognised as having the same architectural historical status as the Georgian building. There’s no sign of a briefing leading to approval by the Adelaide Park Lands Authority, but that’s only because of a big loophole – the Government House domain land is the only North Terrace site not included under the Adelaide Park Lands Act 2005. Traditionally, stage 1 should be an Authority Approvals procedure, given the site’s prominence in the park lands surrounding the city. No-one would dispute the view that the domain is culturally, horticulturally and aesthetically part of Adelaide’s park lands fabric. Given the timeline, however, the loophole is mighty convenient. For a start, the public don’t have to be consulted. If the plan goes ahead it would add yet more evidence for park lands advocates that Adelaide’s green belt continues to be whittled away, and for non-park-lands reasons. They

can fairly claim that converting greenery to hard paving is ‘off message’ – especially in the centre of a city that trumpets the value of its unique parks perimeter to the world on interstate and international tourism websites. Then there’s the likely consequence of the land grab. Locally, hundreds of car drivers weekly would lose parking spaces there, as the western side of Kintore Avenue would become a walking boulevard leading to Torrens Parade Ground. Further, concept drawings illustrate that much of Kintore Avenue would be edged by new bollards. If accurate, there go all the parking spaces from North Terrace to University Drive: currently one of the city’s best ‘quick-visit-to-Rundle Mall’ parking spots north of Gawler Place. The mall’s retail lobby would be delighted. Once finalised, a redesigned Kintore Avenue would be almost certainly snaffled as an ideal bus and taxi layover for Adelaide Oval events. In other words, while not on Anzac or AIF duties, it could regularly become a parking site dedicated to Adelaide Oval duties, closed to normal traffic. Car drivers would have to queue at other congested intersections to get around the roadblock every time there’s an oval major event – at least 44 times annually already. Then there’s state treasurer Tom

The proposal comes soon after a major coup quietly got bedded down at the board of the Adelaide Park Lands Authority, which recently had imposed on it a new Project Advisory Group, comprising three high-level state bureaucrats, one each from Planning, Transport/Infrastructure; Environment and Water Resources, and – wait for it – Renewal SA. At a February meeting, APLA members received a summary that concluded that the existing Park Lands Management Strategy was a crock. “The community feedback identified that, in focusing on enhancement projects, the strategy lacked a strong set of foundation management principles around such things as desirable types of use, equity of access, appropriate forms and scales of development, cultural significance, and research.” Tellingly, in terms of the Anzac Walk proposal, it said: “Although the state government manages almost 20 percent of the park lands, and adopted the strategy, is has not had in place an implementation plan or any one department or position responsible for doing so. The state government has lacked accountability.” The arrival of three bureaucrats from three distinct government silos, and the apparent haste in planning to develop this new incursion into the historic Government House garden domain in less than a year, would appear to provide convincing evidence that this conclusion was on the money.

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16 The Adelaide Review June 2014

HEALTH The War on Mental Illness It is time for a ‘War on Mental Illness’ to be rapidly launched, with the goal of improving our basic understanding of the brain in concert with purposeful translation of advances in science into new and more efficacious preventive measures, treatments, and cures.

by Julio Licinio

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y younger sister died in 1964 at age four of non-Hodgkin’s lymphoma, which was then uniformly fatal. Today, that type of childhood cancer is over 80 percent curable, thanks to the War on Cancer, which started in the United States in 1971, when President Nixon signed the National Cancer Act. The research tools available then were completely inadequate - there was no magnetic resonance imaging (MRI), no positron emission tomography (PET), very rudimentary molecular biology, no genetically modified animals, no automated genome sequencing, no personal computers, no universal databases, and limited access to bibliography. Yet, the enormity of task and the technical limitations of the era did not stop the launch of that successful initiative. The much better tools that we have today give us an amazing advantage; therefore, we are now far better positioned to launch a ‘War on Mental Illness’ than our cancer colleagues of 1971 were to start their exceptionally successful `War on Cancer’. Psychiatric disorders represent a substantial burden to the world. As an example, depression is on average the second cause of disability in developed countries and the fourth in the world. According to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), in the US 11 percent of the population over age 12 is on antidepressants. In Australia, depression represents the largest cause of non-fatal disease burden. Moreover, suicide (which is in most cases an outcome of depression) was ranked by the CDC as the 10th leading cause of death among persons ages 10 years and older in the USA. A recent article by Chevreul and colleagues showed that France, with a population of 65 million, has an estimated 12 million inhabitants currently suffering from one or more mental disorders, which have a total cost of €109 billion, 20 percent of which is actual money spent and 80 percent the social value of disease consequences. The ‘War on Mental Illness’ should include the following: It is really important to sustain existing

investigator-initiated funding mechanisms. We suggest that for a ‘War on Mental Illness’ to be successful, higher numbers of investigatorinitiated grants need to be funded. While investigator-initiated efforts are indispensable, advances accomplished in one single lab and funded by one grant will not resolve the problems related to psychiatric disorders. There is a need for well-structured and well-funded national and international consortia, which have been very successful in other areas of medicine. One of the major human right scandals of our era is the abysmal plight of the mentally ill in some low- and middle-income countries. Effective new efforts need to be set up for global mental health. There are very few dedicated translational psychiatry centres and institutes in the world. Those should be strengthened as national research programs, where new ideas can be tested and developed without the long delays caused by the search for external funding. Philanthropy is greatly needed to support new initiatives and innovative approaches. Some researchers, also known as ‘biohackers’, are becoming de facto sole proprietor businesses, engaged in non-institutional science and technology development. They lease their own infrastructure and operate like micro-companies. Private funding programs are needed to support such high-risk, high-reward independent ventures. Eventually, new treatment approaches need to be effectively commercialised in order to reach vast numbers of people and make a difference in their lives. This requires facilitation and support of start up incubators and efficient technology transfer. While a war on established mental illness is very much needed, according to Benjamin Franklin “an ounce of prevention is worth a pound of cure”. In that context, efforts to promote wellbeing, such as positive psychology and resilience building, as well as the adoption of healthy lifestyles ought to be an integral part of the ‘War on Mental Illness’. It will be likewise crucial to develop and apply preventive strategies for those who are vulnerable to mental illness in childhood and adolescence, before psychiatric disorders become established chronic conditions. The rapid launch of the `War on Mental Illness’ represents medical, scientific, humanitarian, and moral imperatives. Hillel famously stated: “If I am not for myself, who will be for me? And if I am only for myself, then what am I? And if not now, when?” If we do not stand up, not only for ourselves, but also for the hundreds of millions afflicted by mental illness the world over, who will? And if not now, when?

»»Professor Julio Licinio Head, Mind and Brain Theme, South Australian Health and Medical Research Institute (SAHMRI) and Strategic Professor of Psychiatry, School of Medicine, Flinders University


The Adelaide Review June 2014 17

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OPINION Brewing is, as with food harvesting and preparation in any culture, a sophisticated technology. The process of brewing changes nutritional values and provides a range of other advantages – malting renders the grain friable and easier to grind. When mashed, the malted grain provides sweet ‘cakes’ or a sweet barley mash and a malt liquid – all rich in B-vitamins. The sweet liquid (wort) is washed (sparged) out of the barley mash and boiled up with herbs (such as hops) as flavourings and preservatives then fermented to make beer. Narrow-necked pottery vessels keeping air and oxygen out and carbon dioxide in during brewing characterise early western civilisations in Mesopotamia and Egypt – the design keeps the pH low, reducing the chance of toxic brews and making beer less perishable than other cereal products.

Greenspace Beer and civilisation

by Stephen Forbes

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his time last year we sowed a barley ‘crop’ – about 420 square metres – in Adelaide Botanic Gardens. The previous year we sowed a wheat crop on the same site. Fourhundred and twenty square metres of wheat on the Adelaide Plains will keep a family in bread for a year – such a translation is both more challenging and interesting for barley. Nick Steerenberg, the operations manager at Coopers, reckons 175 kg of barley (based on a yield of four tonnes per hectare for the Gardens’ ‘crop’) will return around 145 kg of malt – and if each kilo of malt makes around four litres of beer, the resulting yearly ration from our crop is around one-and-a-half litres of beer per day for a family. Likely you’ll see this as excess you can share or barter. However, in ancient civilizations you might have had a different perspective. If beer was the best alternative to contaminated drinking water, and brewing beer was the key to your family’s nutrition, your perspective on a one-and-a-half litre ration of beer might change substantially – you’d be likely to see this as meagre. The origin of modern agriculture and western civilisation are likely the result of a hunger and thirst for beer – although a rather different beer – soupy thick and low alcohol – substantially less palatable than Dr Tim Cooper’s – but beer nevertheless. The 20th century Australian archaeologist V. Gordon Childe famously labelled two periods of momentous change within the last 10,000 years in the history of western culture as the Neolithic Revolution (the transition from

hunting and gathering to agriculture) and the Urban Revolution (the switch from villagebased societies to societies with towns and cities). The assumption that agriculture – the cultivation of crops and the domestication of animals – was more efficient than hunting and gathering, in terms of return for energy expended in seeking food, or was better able to counter the impacts of poor seasons, is now viewed as largely unconvincing. Indeed, there is strong evidence to suggest that a hunter-gatherer lifestyle is a more energy-efficient choice than early agriculture. Alternative theories abound for the alternative catalysts that might have driven the adoption of agriculture. A few examples include: the adoption of slavery and a culture seeking the accumulation of material wealth; the establishment of significant cadres of specialist skills beyond food production; the perception and selection of plants and animals for domestication; and even the demand for fibres for cord, clothing and sails. The most compelling argument might well be the harnessing of yeasts for brewing beer and baking bread, and the resulting improved nutritional outcomes. Early cereals were quite different from today’s cereals. Indeed, there’s an argument that most cereals would have been toxic to some degree before humans adapted to them and adapted them to us – in part, adverse reactions to gluten today might be the result of a missing evolutionary adaption in gluten sensitive individuals together with changes in our gut’s microbial flora (perhaps the downside of hygiene). Malting and fermentation might then have been a method to reduce the toxicity of cereals by denaturing gluten proteins, converting starches to sugars and synthesising B-vitamins – early cereals, for botanical and biochemical reasons, were likely better suited to making gruel (porridge) or beer than bread.

This is all a lot of work – archaeologists have differing perspectives on why we went to all this trouble. Food historian Rachel Laudan suggests the right question to ask is about what problems a food technology solves. As we’ve seen, the solution early beers provide to poor water quality and improved nutritional outcomes from problematic gluten protein is likely much more important than the production of alcohol per se. Perhaps beer does hold a strong claim for preceding bread in Western civilisation. Bread solves other problems, especially of taste and convenience. Perhaps the path to gluten tolerance was paved by bread. Awkwardly for those without the adaptation to tolerate gluten, cereals for

leavened bread-making have been selected for higher levels of gluten proteins to improve elasticity and strength in leavened dough. While beer might underpin the founding of western civilisation, the Romans were disparaging – Emperor Julian considered wine a nectar and derided beer (and its adherents) as smelling like a goat. Who and from where are you Dionysus? Since by the true Bacchus, I do not recognize you; I know only the son of Zeus. While he smells like nectar, you smell like a goat. Can it be then that the Celts because of lack of grapes Made you from cereals? Therefore one should call you Demetrius, not Dionysus, rather wheat born and Bromus, Not Bromius.

»»For more on the Gardens’ barley crop visit our blog environment.sa.gov.au/botanicgardens/ blog/barley-blog »»Stephen Forbes, Director, Botanic Gardens of Adelaide


18 THE ADELAIDE REVIEW JUNE 2014

FASHION For the new collection, Roberts teamed up with Kara Town (AHD Paper Co), photographer Jenna Agius and local models Sabrina Sterk and Scott Giles. Roberts says having the right team is very important for the Vege Threads brand.

It’s easy to throw around terms such as ‘sustainable’ and ‘eco fashion’, but do you know where your t-shirt is from and who made it? BY SELENA BATTERSBY

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my Roberts is dedicated to creating environmentally friendly fashion with her label Vege Threads, by producing garments that are ethically made, low-impact and sustainable – designed to be worn year-round and stand the test of time. Vege Threads uses 100 percent certified organic cotton jersey and a sheer luxe tencel. All cotton used is certified by GOTS (Global Organic Textile Standard) and all tencel is sustainably harvested and processed by Lenzing (a leader in marketing and manufacturing man-made cellulose fibres). It is grown in controlled settings using only natural fertilisers, with no pesticides, herbicides or other chemicals in sight. Lenzing tencel – a plant-based lyocell fibre that hails only from sustainable forests is extremely absorbent,

irritation free, naturally prevents the growth of bacteria and is 100 percent biodegradable. All pieces are made in Indonesia under fair and monitored working conditions.

FASHION RENDEZVOUS

THREADS OF THE EARTH

Her inspiration for the new season follows similar minimalist themes and easy-to-wear styles seen in the summer collection but further develops the Vege Threads aesthetic with nautical stripes. This season introduces new colours of natural blues, earthy greens, off-white and a natural dark black – a mix of indigo and Ketapang leaf, a tropical almond leaf carrying a warm brown undertone. Roberts explains, “Although I have separated the collections across two seasons, I try to design pieces that move against the grain of fast fashion ‘trends’ and can be worn all year round. The vibe for the collection definitely has a coastal feel, with the capsule range of nautical stripes and fisherman knits.”

Roberts designs her garments to be worn by all ages, body shapes and across seasons. “I design a lot of styles for Vege Threads continuously, such as, when a shape responds well with customers or from feedback about particular cuts they like. As I work with natural dyes, the process is based a lot around fabrics and the colours we can develop. This range focuses on 100 percent organic cotton basics, a luxe tencel, an organic lycra for the active yoga wear and the new unisex capsule collection of knits.”

“It was really great to have Kara helping me for the autumn/winter location shoot. After working together on The Town Local pop up, I knew Kara had an amazing eye for detail and style, and also as a close friend, she has seen the brand develop and knew my ideas of what I wanted from the shoot. It’s been really fulfilling to be able to collaborate with like-minded people in Adelaide who see the potential in building something great even from a small city. Sabrina is a very soulful, holistic girl, who has her own organic health blog (The Living Table) and lives her life with the same values as Vege Threads. Scotty (our male model) has his own organic coffee brand (Mischief Brew), so both individuals are really grounded, lovely people who see the value in what I’m doing and that’s a really important thing in my brand.” Working with online store Walter G on handdyed tote bags is just the beginning for Vege Threads, as Roberts looks forward to more collaborations in the future. “I am currently looking at a small collaboration with a kidswear lifestyle brand. We are throwing around some ideas, but nothing concrete just yet!”

vegethreads.com

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The Adelaide Review June 2014 19

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FASHION

in a golden era of watchmaking where new ‘complications’ are being developed, and older, pragmatically obsolete ones are being reintroduced and refined. Men especially are buying watches in growing numbers. At its most compelling, watches offer a spectacular point of collision between form and function and generally, the more appealing the form, the greater the demand. Custodianship of the past in a digital age… Though mechanical wristwatch technology has unequivocally been bettered, there is something timeless about regularly wearing and using a watch. With the ever diminishing cycles between cutting edge and obsolete in digital technologies, there’s a lot of old school pleasure and comfort to be had in wearing a new or vintage watch. This connection or window to the past is perhaps best reflected in wristwatches offered with optional see-through casebacks.

Timeless Pieces Over the next few editions, The Adelaide Review will be offering a glimpse into the world of wristwatches. by Matt Wallace

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he wristwatch offers a fascinating point of intersection for fashion, tools, satellite technologies and modern-but-arcane technologies.

They range in price from less than $100 through to ‘the sky is the limit’. I’ll be concentrating mostly on watches that can be bought for around a $100 through to a few thousand, with a particular focus on mechanical watches. Who needs a watch? From a functionality standpoint, no one really needs a watch. Your smartphone, and even your old mobile, will likely perform timekeeping duties as well or better than anything you can put on your wrist. There’s no obvious relationship between accuracy and price either, as a very nice battery-powered watch that you can buy in a mall for $100 to 200 is likely to outperform a modern mechanical watch worth thousands. Who wants one? Jewellery for blokes? Technologies underpinning mechanical watches haven’t changed a great deal in the last 100 years. Despite that, we are currently

Custodianship and the heirloom factor…

Mechanical watches are a kind of living technological heirloom, improving while preserving, and will very likely become a family heirloom. With regular servicing, mechanical watches can last 100 years, or significantly more if restored every century or so. They represent something historical and atavistic, the passing on of something of value from our shared cultural history, which we can then make deeply personal by passing it on to a loved one. A watch can be a link between a sense of a shared past and a very personal future. Watches such as the Rpaige ‘Wrocket’ with its see through caseback offer a window into the past. It is a modern rehousing of a meticulously restored antique American Pocket Watch movement. The dial, hands and case are brand new, the movement is somewhere between 80 and 110 years old. The leather bracelets are produced from Australian fish skins. It is something modern inspired entirely by the past, which will could potentially be worn by someone decades away. You might be surprised to know that it’s not just the old firms making watches… there are a few new ones too, including Australian companies like Bausele and the Melbourne Watch Company. Definitely worth the time for a second glance.

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20 The Adelaide Review June 2014

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Little Bird Her Majesty’s Theatre, 58 Grote Street Friday, June 6, 8pm State Theatre Company presents a unique and rich theatrical experience for the Adelaide Cabaret Festival. Little Bird is a one-man musical drama written especially for the talents of the incomparable king of cabaret, Paul Capsis. Little Bird follows the journey of a young boy, Wren, from his parents’ isolated cottage to the lights of the big city. Along the way a series of startling transformations occur, blurring the lines of identity and gender as Wren searches for self, love and a place to belong.

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The Rover In cinemas from Thursday, June 12 A loner tracks the gang who stole his car from a desolate town in the Australian outback with the forced assistance of a wounded guy left behind in the wake of the theft. Directed by David Michôd. Stars Guy Pearce, Robert Pattinson and Scoot McNairy.

Take Five: The Dave Brubeck Story The Promethean, 116 Grote Street Saturday, June 21, 8pm Brendan Fitzgerald Quartet recreates the world of iconic jazz musician Dave Brubeck, his genius, his relationships, his humanity and popular acclaim. Brendan performs Brubeck’s music and tells the story at the piano with a projected montage of images while Andy Firth, internationally acclaimed saxophonist, plays the musical role of Paul Desmond, Brubeck’s creative ally and sometime adversary.

TOSA A Musical Kaleidoscope Capri Theatre, 141 Goodwood Road Sunday, June 29, 2pm Theatre Organ Society SA presents Donna Parker (USA) playing the Wurlitzer theatre pipe organ. Fun and fresh music selected from Frozen, Grease, Mamma Mia, Hairspray, Michael Buble and many more hits.

Concerto for Orchestra Adelaide Town Hall,128 King William Street Friday, July 25,8pm The Adelaide Symphony Orchestra is joined by American conductor, Eugene Tzigane for one of the 20th century’s great orchestral showpieces – Bartók’s Concerto for Orchestra. Also on the program is Dvorák’s much-loved Cello Concerto featuring ‘X-factor’ German cellist Alban Gerhardt plus works by Australian composer Peter Sculthorpe.

Salisbury Writers’ Festival Writers’ Forum John Harvey Gallery, 12 James Street, Salisbury Saturday, August 23, 9am The Salisbury Writers’ Festival Writers’ Forum offers a series of lively talks for writers of all genres and abilities. Time permitting, sessions will allow questions from the floor.

Cabaret Fringe Brings Life to Winter June is ‘cabaret season’ in Adelaide with the Adelaide Cabaret Festival and the Cabaret Fringe Festival providing an opportunity for people to embrace winter and head out to experience the ambience of cabaret.

by Tish Custance

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n 2008, brothers Peter and Adam Boylon and Jay Robinson founded the Cabaret Fringe Festival to celebrate the art form of Cabaret and give local cabaret artists a chance to join the June excitement of the Adelaide Cabaret Festival. “Historically there have been limited show spaces in Adelaide Cabaret Frestival, as it is a showcase of what the world has to offer not just Adelaide. The demand for these show spaces from artists far outweighs the availability hence there being an opportunity for the fringe to develop,” Peter Boylon sayd. Originally the festival was held at La Boheme over a few weeks, but now, in its seventh year, has more than 45 shows across 13 venues for the month of June. This year, the festival has a new director, Eugene Suleau, and a new team putting on the event, with only Peter and Adam Boylon as the original members of the “creative team”. Despite its growth tripling the amount of shows offered, Peter says that the Cabaret Fringe Festival is still a “totally artist-driven festival” as they don’t produce any shows themselves. The kinds of acts performing at the festival have diversified over the years and Peter says it’s all a part of people learning to understand that cabaret is a mode of performance of any art form, be it dance, music, sketches or jazz.

The demand for these show spaces from artists far outweighs the availability hence there being an opportunity for the fringe to develop”

One of the jazz shows at this year’s festival is Take Five – The Dave Brubeck Story, a soldout show at last year’s festival. The Brendan Fitzgerald Quartet recreates the music of Dave Brubeck and Paul Desmond’s platinum album, Time Out and features Andy Firth, a multiaward winning saxophonist. “I have had a burning desire since my youth as a pianist to present the music of Dave Brubeck to the general public since he was, in his own day, one of the most popular musicians on the planet,” says Fitzgerald. “Not only that, but the era of the 1950s and 60s was a special time in the global recovery period post the Second World War. I decided that playing Brubeck’s music was not enough in itself to adequately honour his great contribution to music and humanity. “Once I dug deeper, the story that emerged became engrossing and fascinating. What better forum to position it for performance than in a cabaret festival, combining exceptional music, narrative, humour and a range of emotions,” he says. Having the Adelaide Cabaret Festival running at the same time as the Cabaret Fringe Festival has brought even more attention to the art form of cabaret in Adelaide and around the nation. “With both festivals on, there are over 100 separate cabaret shows on in June, which definitely makes Adelaide the epicentre or the resurgence of the art form in the world. In Australia alone, Melbourne, Sydney, Brisbane and Darwin have all started cabaret festivals on the back of our combined successes,” Peter says.

»»Cabaret Fringe Festival Sunday, June 1 to Sunday, June 29 cabaretfringefestival.com


THE ADELAIDE REVIEW JUNE 2014 21

ADELAIDEREVIEW.COM.AU

BOOKS WELLINGTON: THE PATH TO VICTORY 1769-1814 Rory Muir / Yale

BY ROGER HAINSWORTH

“Let us bury the great duke…” intoned Lord Tennyson but Rory Muir has brought him to life. There have been many biographies and you might reasonably ask if we need another. I have read several full-length studies of Wellington’s military life. Most were interesting, even enthralling, but none equals Muir’s ability to take us behind the facade of Military Hero to discover the extraordinarily talented but fallible human within. Muir is better qualified than most to accept such a challenge. An Adelaide University alumnus, he has devoted his life to illuminating the Napoleonic War in British

economic or otherwise. There’s a former lion park to the west of Melbourne, an inner suburban swimming hole in the Yarra where the former cotton mill is being knocked down to make way for the Eastern freeway, rural hamlets that are little more than a petrol station and a train siding. In ‘China’ the ex-con town boy Cal finds his way back to his beautiful ex-girlfriend, and in ‘The Toecutters’ two boys, who are seduced by the adventure-romance of the inner city criminal underworld, try to reclaim their waterhole from developers. In ‘Refuge of Sinners’ the narrator’s son has died in an accident whose true colour we’re never quite shown. In ‘Sticky Fingers’ the music of The Rolling Stones offers a group of humiliated boys playing in the City Marbles Championship, a joyous way out of the moribund 1960s and into the promise of a new post-Beatles decade.

THE PROMISE Tony Birch / UQP BY DAVID SORNIG

Tony Birch’s latest collection of stories, The Promise, is sugared with nostalgia, a sweetness that remembers a greater Melbourne somewhere in the 1960s and 70s in the grip of development, where freedoms and innocence are tumbling away. The stories inhabit places that are invisible to the map because they don’t have a place in any order – legal, adult,

Birch observes his psychogeographical spaces through the voices of male, boys and men, who aren’t in complete control of what’s going on around them. They’re young, they’re indigenous, they’re poor, they’re lost, they’re emotionally bereft. Rather than resisting their predicaments with violence, Birch offers models of masculinity that are humane and emotionally honest. Over and again, his characters face loss. How they deal with that loss comes to define them in the wedges of time in which we encounter them. Birch often follows the wake of some incidental element of a story until it becomes the centre. ‘The

history. His successful doctoral thesis (1988) was the ‘British Government and the Peninsular War 18081811’. Never published, its formidable research underpins this book as it did his masterly Britain and the Defeat of Napoleon 1807-1815 (1996), which, like his Salamanca 1812 (2002), Yale also published. It says much for Yale University Press’s respect for Muir that they allowed him 727 pages for what is only volume one of his Wellington biography. Volume two containing the Waterloo Campaign and Wellington’s long political career is yet to come. May I live to review it! Muir demonstrates what can be achieved in penetrating analysis when a sympathetic but objective researcher steeps himself in Wellington’s correspondence (40 volumes or more published, and at least 100,000 in manuscript at Southampton University). Arthur Wellesley had his faults. Muir is suitably scathing about Wellington’s ceaseless grumbling to the British ministry and his grotesque ingratitude for their four-year long support. Then,

like other commanders, he committed mistakes that cost men’s lives but unlike some more recent generals, he admitted his errors and learned from them. On the other hand, even staff officers who disliked him personally admitted that in battle he was the essential man. Things went badly in his temporary absence but quickly went well after he galloped up. No wonder he complained that even their victories could not convince his generals they could beat the French. His soldiers knew better. Pointing him out to a new chum before Waterloo a veteran said: “That’s the long-nosed b-- what beats the French.” Throughout this book, Muir’s cogent analysis repeatedly demonstrates how he did it. His analysis of the seemingly miraculous early summer campaign across northern Spain that ended with Wellington’s destruction of King Joseph’s Bonaparte’s army at Vittorio is particularly memorable. After he crossed the Pyrenees and took Toulouse the news at last arrived: Napoleon had abdicated. All Britain rejoiced and the Prince Regent made Arthur Wellesley a duke.

Money Shot’ is a Guy Ritchie-like heist story in which a gang’s plan to blackmail a rich professor is complicated by the presence of a baby. By the end of the story, control of the gang and the entire nature of the heist is upturned. ‘The Ghost of Hank Williams’ explores the self-defeating logic of alcoholism and its attendant poverty, the pools of clarity and the drink logic in between, before delivering paradigm-shift that asks the reader to revisit everything they’ve just read.

to whom they’ve long belonged, even if they don’t recognise just how deeply that belonging reaches into them.

There’s also a sometimes-unnerving, but also deeply moving, even spiritual quiver running through the stories. In ‘The Promise’, ‘The Lovers’ and ‘Distance’ the narrators are almost fatalistically claimed by the places and people

Through it all is a message: time marches on. Change happens. The stories rim the lip of the funnel that empties out into the present, speaking to the complicated memory of how we end up being who we are.

Stylistically the stories are deceptively simple. Often their style is so brisk that it feels as if they’re taking shortcuts. But that in itself is their craft. These are stories that put the telling in the foreground, not the cleverness of their making.

Friends of the University of Adelaide Library

Professor Warren Bebbington Vice-Chancellor and President The University of Adelaide The Friends of the University of Adelaide Library invite you to join us for a special address from Professor Warren Bebbington. A Fulbright Scholar, Professor Bebbington studied at the University of Melbourne and in New York at Queens College and Columbia University, completing masters degrees in Arts, Music, and Philosophy, and a PhD. He was a Deputy Vice-Chancellor at the University of Melbourne with prior academic roles at the University of Queensland and the Australian National University. Professor Bebbington is currently Chair of the South Australian ViceChancellor’s Committee and Chair of the South Australian Tertiary Admissions Centre. He was appointed as a Board Director of Universities Australia in May 2014.

Thursday 19 June 2014 at 6.00 for 6.30pm Ira Raymond Exhibition Room, Barr Smith Library, University of Adelaide Bookings by Tuesday 17 June to: robina.weir@adelaide.edu.au or telephone 8313 4064 $5 admission / Open to the public / Seating is limited

2014 Salisbury Writers’ Festival 22 August - 31 August 2014 Program now available on our website www.salisbury.sa.gov.au/swf


22 The Adelaide Review June 2014

PERFORMING ARTS

Drink to a Decade

too much. All these characters and lifetimes’ worth of stories, however, won’t make Coates an author. “If I ever decide to write a book, would you come round here and punch me in the face?” she says. “If Tristan ever decides to write a book, I’ll punch him in the face.” The Audreys have been staples on the Adelaide scene for a decade – though Goodall now lives in Melbourne. Coates lives in the Hills and she’s torn between two places to recommend to adventurous locals. The first – brace yourselves – is the Mt Barker Bowls Club.

Taasha Coates discusses 10 years of Adelaide altfolk duo The Audreys, an anniversary punctuated by a rockier new album ‘Til My Tears Roll Away.

“It’s the most incredible bowls club I’ve ever seen,” she says. “It’s fully covered; it’s ridiculous. Seriously, if you’re into bowls, you’ve got it made there.”

The Audreys

by Ilona Wallace

I

“We had to work around my two-year-old this time, so it was a little more prosaic,” Coates says about writing ‘Til My Tears Roll Away.

t’s Friday afternoon when Coates of picks up the phone. She has a “bit of a Friday arvo thing” going on, and is looking forward to a glass of wine. On reflection, it’s a happy thing that this is a Friday afternoon affair – she’s not part of the ‘Tuesday Morning Wine Club’, who you’ll meet in a moment.

“‘Quick! The kid’s asleep. Let’s go!’ That kind of thing. Whereas we have – like a pair of wankers – flown to New York and recorded an album in the Chelsea Hotel, back in 2006 or 2008. This time was more … around the lounge room, around the coffee table, while the kid was sleeping. Not nearly as glamorous.”

For The Audreys, the days of “pack everything up, chuck it in the van and come back nine weeks later with some serious liver disease” are over. “It’s a bit of a kid’s game, isn’t it?” Coates says, laughing.

Although they’re “happier, more stable people” than ever before, it’s the things that have remained the same about The Audreys that are most heart-warming. Particularly, their love of story. Their years of songwriting have given – rather upsetting – lives to many, many characters.

She and Tristan Goodall have played it for 10 years – getting closer and stronger, and building an impressive memory bank of music and travelling.

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“Look at these poor, sad people,” Coates reflects with a laugh. “But you see, they’re more interesting that way, aren’t they? They’re the Tuesday Morning Wine Club.”

Unfortunately, Coates won’t be able to tell you much about the day-to-day running of the tournaments. Has she seen a game? “No, I haven’t, but I have snuck into the bar.” Now that’s a bit more rock ‘n’ roll.

But who are these people who populate their songs? Coates is quick to make plain that they’re not autobiographical. “My father is not an alcoholic gambler and my mother is not dead,” she says of new track Ballad for the Fallen. “A lot of our characters are part of the same person,” she explains. “He or she is just one of those people whose life just hasn’t gone right. “On our first record, we had a song called Susanne. The bridge was ‘Susanne thinks living is easy for some, waits for the day when her turn will come, she doesn’t see her time’s already run’. It’s about a woman who is still waiting for her dreams to come true and hasn’t realised that it’s never going to happen. “She’s a good character; I like Susanne. I mean, she’s a bit of a fuck-up, but most of our characters are.” Other memorable faces include the title characters from Sally & The Preacher – both drunks, with the latter liking the altar wine a little

“I’ll tell you what’s really cool up here,” Coates continues. “There’s a brewery called the Prancing Pony. It’s really difficult to find; I am a bit challenged when it comes to signage, but I did drive around for a few minutes because I saw a massive sign off the main road then just got completely lost.” Looking back on the past 10 years – with their first gig back in July 2004 – Coates is happy with where The Audreys have been and where they’re going. For the big 1-0, the tour will be a bit of a party. “I love a good excuse to celebrate.”

»»The Audreys The Governor Hindmarsh Friday, July 11 theaudreys.com.au

BOHEMIAN RHAPSODIES

MOZART @ ELDER

MEET THE ORCHESTRA

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Wednesday 4 June, 6.30pm Adelaide Town Hall

Wednesday 11 June, 11.30am Elder Hall

Saturday 14 June, 10am & 12 noon Grainger Studio

Fri 20 June, 8pm & Sat 21 June, 6.30pm Adelaide Town Hall

Howard Shelley Director/Piano

Nathan Aspinall Conductor Celia Craig Oboe

Jay Laga’aia Presenter David Sharp Conductor

Arvo Volmer Conductor Maxim Rysanov Viola

Mozart Overture Idomeneo Strauss Oboe Concerto Haydn Symphony No 83 La poule

Ages 4+

Smetana The Bartered Bride Overture Mozart Piano Concerto No 23 Dvořák Symphony No 6

Prokofiev Peter and the Wolf

Schubert Overture in C Major In the Italian Style Mendelssohn Symphony No 4 Italian Berlioz Harold in Italy


THE ADELAIDE REVIEW JUNE 2014 23

ADELAIDEREVIEW.COM.AU

PERFORMING ARTS explained Capsis. “I enjoyed it as a piece just to read. I’ve never worked with Geordie before, so it’s great to work with all these new people whom I haven’t worked with, Cameron and Quentin, I haven’t worked with any of them.”

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The five-time Helpmann Award winner is best known to Adelaide audiences for A Company of Strangers as well as many solo shows including last year’s The Paul Capsis Revue. The star of films such as Head On and 2013’s The Boy Castaways says Little Bird takes The Juniper Tree and gives it a gender-themed makeover.

Paul Capsis

And Your Bird Can Sing Cabaret Festival favourite Paul Capsis discusses his starring role in the winter festival’s most anticipated production of 2014, Little Bird.

BY DAVID KNIGHT

F

resh off a plane from Sydney (for the Harbour City’s run of Windmill’s Pinocchio) to rehearsals for Little Bird, a tired but excited Paul Capsis meets The Adelaide Review, as Australia’s king of cabaret will star in the first collaboration between the Cabaret Festival and the State Theatre Company, Little Bird. Following Pinocchio, this will be the second Adelaide-based production in a row for Capsis. Written by Nicki Bloom (Land and Sea), directed by Geordie Brookman (State Theatre’s Artistic Director) and with songs by Cameron Goodall and Quentin Grant (You, Me and The Bloody Sea), Little Bird is a showcase of Adelaide’s finest, aside from the starring role, which was created especially for Capsis. The versatile singer and actor plays Wren, the star of this adult fairy tale, which is based on The Juniper Tree by the Brothers Grimm. Promoted as ‘Brothers Grimm meet Ziggy Stardust’, Capsis says he was attracted to the project due to the challenge of performing this huge show solo, as well as the quality of Bloom’s writing. “As soon as it was presented I said, ‘I love this’,”

“What appeals to me are those weird things, those out of the box things, and a subject matter that’s a little difficult because of the fact that this character is uncertain about who he is, which happens in real life. There are people who don’t know where they fit either sexually or just life in general – they don’t feel comfortable in their bodies. There’s a bit of that in this piece in that Wren isn’t comfortable, Wren isn’t sure and he tries to find himself via other people and their energies and experiences.”

PLAYS

JAMES

BOND

A live band will back Capsis on a stage designed by Geoff Cobham. He says the songs written by Goodall and Grant are Nick Cave-esque. “It’s got a bit of that vibe; rock and folk, it’s not musical theatre that’s for sure. Although there’s a lot of storytelling, in the songs, it’s more my flavour of music. I guess, it’s more rocking.” Capsis stresses that Little Bird is not musical theater in the vein of Dreamgirls or Gypsy. “There’s a difference between this and musical theatre and cabaret. This is more like the German style of musical theatre.” Though we have seen Capsis perform many different productions in Adelaide, there is one yet to hit Adelaide, the acclaimed solo show Angela’s Kitchen. “People ask me all the time, ‘Are you going to bring it back?’ A lot of people didn’t see it, even in Sydney. We did two sellout seasons in Sydney because it was in the Griffin Theatre, which has 100 seats. Who knew it was going to be so successful? I certainly was the last person who thought it was going to do any good. “I would love to do it again. When? I don’t know but I would love to bring it back at some stage. It also scares me because it took a lot out of me, more than I ever realised it would, because of the personal nature of it and that it was me on stage for an hour and 18 minutes non-stop.”

» Little Bird Adelaide Cabaret Festival Her Majesty’s Theatre Friday, June 6 to Sunday, June 22 adelaidefestivalcentre.com.au/adelaide-cabaretfestival

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24 THE ADELAIDE REVIEW JUNE 2014

PERFORMING ARTS

Future Presents If you make your way down to Vitalstatistix in Port Adelaide this Queen’s Birthday longweekend you’ll see some of Australia’s most exciting performance makers trying out new ideas on you, their willing test audience. Rosie Dennis

BY JANE HOWARD

A

mongst the fray will be the presentation of Future Presents, the culmination of a two-week residency project for 10 South Australian artists lead by Rosie Dennis. Dennis is the artistic director of Western Sydney-based Company Urban Theatre Projects, a 31-year-old organisation that, as Dennis describes, is always asking, “Whose story isn’t being told? Whose voice haven’t we been hearing [in] the mainstream theatre?” Vitalstatistix has been running Adhocracy since 2011, giving local artists the opportunity to collaborate and learn from a leading Australian practitioner over two weeks, and then a national collection of artists developing new work over the long weekend. This year’s residency ties into Vitalstatistix’s ongoing commitment to developing socially conscious theatre makers, with an emphasis on the pertinent issue of climate change. For this, Dennis and the 10 artists will be talking to local members of Primary Industries, discussing their work and the way this plays into global conversations on climate change, and the ways people are changing their habits to, hopefully, have a beneficial impact on the world.

Social consciousness has always been core to Dennis’ work, thinking about “ways to frame an arts practice that has a wider reach, and that the themes can be universal, so people can find a way in”. “You think about climate change,” says Dennis. “A whole lot of people in this country – ears will just shut when they hear that. It’s such a big thing.” These big, politically charged issues, she says, are so “difficult for the everyday person to get their head around. And that’s what I really love about making art in this way: if somehow you can observe and listen and find a way to find the humanness in it, then maybe people [can think] ‘that makes more sense to me now. It’s not just a statistic; it’s got everyday meaning for me in my everyday life.’” In a more truncated creative process than what Dennis would typically employ, meetings over these initial five days are designed for the artists to consider new ways of working. It’s about showing local practitioners, from a variety of backgrounds from dance to illustration, how to start an art project outside of a studio, or outside of their own area. “What do you do when you’ve heard form a wind farmer or a free-range egg farmer?” Dennis wants

them to ask. “How is art positioned within that, and have you got anything to say in response to that?” The variety in the artists’ backgrounds will also contribute to the development. Says Dennis: “Hopefully there will be a range of different responses, and the artists themselves will feed and fuel each other. It’s always exciting for an artist to go into a space of not knowing, and being really open to finding out what might emerge.”

Guitar Festival Program

Over the two weeks, interested members of the public can follow the project on its blog, and then join the artists for performances on the Saturday and Sunday nights. Finally, on the Monday night Vitalstatistix will host a panel discussion, including some of the people the group meet in their research. Together, says Dennis, they will be “looking towards the future, and a hypothetical about primary industry, climate change, and the food coming to our table”.

World-class international acts, an exciting collaboration with a Spanish sister event and the unveiling of the Adelaide Guitar Festival Orchestra are just some of the thrilling announcements of the 2014 Adelaide International Guitar Festival (AIGF).

For a project exploring climate change, it makes sense that the process will also have cause for the artists to turn their gaze back on themselves and consider their own impact on the environment. Through the residency, their environmental impact will be tracked: has someone forgotten their keep-cup and bought a take-away coffee? How is their food packaged? How much fuel is used driving to each site? From looking at their impact, the group can then also consider how to offset this footprint. When I ask if it’s correct they’re aiming for the project to be carbon neutral, Dennis laughs. “It’s yet to be seen if we can make it completely carbon neutral,” she says. “But absolutely we’ll be tracking our carbon footprint along the way.” And at the weekend presentations, everyone will be able to see how successful they have been. “We’ll make it really transparent,” she says. “Because I think it will be quite fun.”

» Vitalstatistix Adhocracy Waterside, 11 Nile Street, Port Adelaide Saturday, June 7 to Monday, June 9 vitalstatistixtheatrecompany.blogspot.com.au

DORIS Jeff Lewis & Melinda Schneider present

BY DAVID KNIGHT

A

rtistic Director Slava Grigoryan announced the line-up for the fifth Guitar Festival today, which runs from Thursday, July 17 to Sunday, July 20. Headliners include Spain’s flamenco kings the José Antonio Rodríguez Trio. The trio will perform on AIGF’s opening night (Thursday, July 17) and is the result of a collaboration with The Cordoba Guitar Festival, the sister event of the AIGF. Grigoryan says this collaboration is an “exciting new development”.

“The Cordoba Guitar Festival has always been a huge inspiration to all of us,” Grigoryan tells The Adelaide Review. “It’s been around for well over 30 years and also celebrates the guitar in all of its many shapes and colours. Their expression of interest in collaborating with us was a massive thrill! Looking to the future, I’m particularly excited about the possibility of commissioning new work together, continuing the introduction and exchange of artists and expanding on the cultural connection between our two countries.”

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The Adelaide Review June 2014 25

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PERFORMING ARTS together, learn from each other, inspire each other and hopefully take this passion for the instrument with them through life. The ultimate goal would be for this orchestra to exist and thrive outside of the guitar festival.” Other acts part of this year’s eclectic festival include Judicaël Perroy and the Máximo Pujol Trio, Pepe Romero and Yamandú Costa, as well as Guthrie Govan. Grigoryan says there is no overriding theme to this year’s festival. “The program is very much ‘artist’ driven and usually this collective sets the tone for each festival. This year for example, there’s a strong gypsy thread – Stochelo Rosenberg Trio, the various flamenco inspired performances, Indian master Debashish Bhattacharya and the Maximo Diego Pujol Trio from Buenos Aires. Musically they are all very different – inspired by their own cultures yet always looking outward. They all share a unifying musical language – warmth, deep emotion, and of course extraordinary virtuosity.”

from Svoboda’s Aurora Guitar Ensemble. “The Adelaide Guitar Festival Orchestra is also another new development that will be introduced at this year’s festival,” Grigoryan explains. “The concept of a guitar orchestra has been around for quite a long time now. There

are some great groups around Australia now and a great tradition is being built in other parts of the world. Being the home of such a unique guitar festival I felt that Adelaide was in desperate need of an orchestra like this. It’s a brilliant opportunity for young students, from the city and from regional areas, to play

»»Adelaide International Guitar Festival Adelaide Festival Centre Thursday, July 17 to Sunday, July 20 adelaidefestivalcentre.com.au/guitar-festival

A C S S E A S O N 2 014

Darkness & Light

Conducted by adelaide Christie Anderson chamber with guest singers Zephyr Quartet

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Gypsy guitarist Stochelo Rosenberg and his trio will close the festival with their Gypsy jazz stylings. The trio will be supported by the inaugural Adelaide Guitar Festival Orchestra, a handpicked crop of 50 of the best South Australian young guitar players who will join Grigoryan and Brisbane’s Paul Svoboda, as well as 25 players


26 The Adelaide Review June 2014

PERFORMING ARTS

A Choirmaster’s Circle of Success Photo: Keith Saunders

Choir of King’s College, Cambridge by Graham Strahle

T

he sight of 16 red-frocked boy choristers and 14 choral scholars filing onto stage and singing with their renowned precision is one of the rarer delights we ever get to experience. The last time Choir of King’s College, Cambridge were in Adelaide was more than a decade ago, in 2001, when they sang midwinter carols in the Town Hall. They come again this August to grace the Festival Theatre – one hopes its acoustics will treat the young singers kindly. It will be a concert that in many ways represents the journey that this most famous of English choirs has taken under its director of 32 years, Stephen Cleobury. Choir of King’s College now performs and records an extraordinary diversity of music for what has been in its five centuries a traditional chapel choir. No doubt many listeners will continue to associate King’s with their immaculate evensong performances,

but these days one is just as likely to hear the choir tackling Mahler, Britten, Arvo Pärt or John Rutter. Additionally, it commissions composers from all around the world to write new works for its internationally televised annual Festival of Nine Lessons and Carols. Australian composers Peter Sculthorpe, Brett Dean and Carl Vine have each been asked to write carols for this festival in past years, and we’ll get to hear all three in this concert, along with music of Palestrina, Byrd, Parry, Britten and Fauré. It’s quite a spread of repertoire for a choir made up of schoolboys and university undergraduates, but as a program this is now typical of what King’s takes on its overseas tours. The biggest challenge with this expanded repertoire, says Cleobury, is the choir’s quick turnover of membership. Boy choristers last on

Choir of King’s College, Cambridge

average five years, the choral scholars three-tofour years. “I think it’s a very nice thing to do, to sing music by composers whose countries we visit. The pieces by Sculthorpe, Dean and Vine, are all ones we’ve sung before, but the quite rapid turnover of the choir means that effectively these are new pieces each time we do them. “I’ve seen it as my duty to bring as wide a repertoire to the singers as possible. In around 1995, I was appointed chief conductor of the BBC Singers, which had 24 fulltime singers, and it was a marvellous thing to do. It opened my ears to other sounds in vocal performance and I’ve become aware of a wider repertoire. This choir has young people in it, all up to 22 years old, which give it a freshness and lightness of sound. And they’ve not yet developed

vibrato. The advantage is that one can work on blending the sound. When singers are 10 to 15 years older one can work with their greater vocal maturity, but less with blend.” Cleobury concedes, nevertheless, that audiences probably mostly come to hear what Choir of King’s College is best renowned for – singing polyphonic masterpieces from the Renaissance and Baroque. But here too things are different now, he explains. “Other things have changed due to the wheels of fashion. We’ve become much more aware of historical performance practice. So far as what one understands by authenticity, we aim at that, with the result that we try to be as close as possible to the intentions of the composer for each piece.” When his singers take on Palestrina or Byrd, he says character of line and enunciation of text are paramount. “Because there’s quite complex contrapuntal interplay in their music, the aim is to make it as clear as possible.” When one part carries more importance for example, he says, it needs lifting above the other parts. “This is one of the tasks of conducting, to make the intentions of the composer as clear as possible and bring out the architecture of the piece.”

“It’s the Lion king on steroids.” Dominion Post, NZ BRENDAN FITZGERALD QUARTET

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Recreates the world of iconic jazz musician Dave Brubeck, his genius, his relationships, his humanity and popular acclaim. In 1959, Dave Brubeck Quartet¹s album, “Time Out” became the first platinum jazz disc. Their composition “Take Five”, remains the highest selling jazz instrumental of all time. Brendan narrates the story at the piano together with a projected montage of images from Brubeck¹s life. Andy Firth, internationally acclaimed saxophonist, performs the music of Paul Desmond, Brubeck¹s creative ally and sometime adversary. This ensemble comprises four outstanding musicians. Satomi Ohnishi, drums and Quinton Dunne, double bass, join Brendan and Andy for this event. ‘The Brendan Fitzgerald Quartet is a very impressive unit.’ (Cabaret Broadway World, 2013)

The Promethean 116 Grote St, Adelaide Sat, June 21, 8pm and Sun, June 22, 3pm & 7pm $38/$35 conc. $33 groups $50 CD & show Bookings: cabaretfringefestival.com Information: brendanfitzgerald.com

Cleobury adds that selecting singers has become noticeably harder in recent years. “Today it is different compared to 40 years ago when I started as a professional director of music. Then there was singing in local churches and schools. It’s not that there are fewer good singers now, but it means that a much bigger part of the audition process has to look at musical potential over training. This may also be the case in Australia, I think. The problem is that young singers need a ladder to climb up. “I’d describe it as a circle of success. I’ve seen it happen with overseas choirs I’ve worked with. If aspirations are set high, then comes the gratitude and excitement if those aspirations are met. Then a choir can keep excelling.”

»»Choir of King’s College, Cambridge Adelaide Festival Theatre Saturday, August 2 musicaviva.com.au


THE ADELAIDE REVIEW JUNE 2014 27

ADELAIDEREVIEW.COM.AU

PERFORMING ARTS

THIS MONTH THE ADELAIDE REVIEW’S GUIDE TO JUNE’S HIGHLIGHT PERFORMING ARTS EVENTS

JEFF LANG Nexus Multicultural Arts Centre Friday, June 6 nexus.asn.au

ELDER CONSERVATORIUM OF MUSIC PRESENT S

2014 SERIES OF INTIMATE CONCE RTS

SUNDAY 8 JUNE | 3.00PM

AT ELDER HALL

BENAUD TRIO: Horizons Nicholas Buc Trailer Music Franz Schubert Notturno in E-flat Major D.897 Johannes Brahms Piano Trio in C Major Op.87 Tickets: $25/$18 | General Admission Book online at www.elderhall.adelaide.edu.au

Aussie roots and blues artist Jeff Lang returns to Adelaide to tour his new album I Live a Lot in my Head These Days as part of the Nexus Live series at Nexus Multicultural Arts Centre. Lang’s critically acclaimed new album is the latest in a series of eclectic genre-bending albums from the Aussie troubadour. Joining Lang is folk and roots artist Glenn Skuthorpe.

E L D E R C O N S E RVAT O R I U M O F M U S I C

ADELAIDE CABARET FESTIVAL Adelaide Festival Centre Friday, June 6 to Saturday, June 21 adelaidefestivalcentre.com.au/ adelaide-cabaret-festival Kate Ceberano’s final Cabaret Festival as Artistic Director sees a gang of international and Australian stars descend on Adelaide for the winter festival including Darlene Love, Caroline Nin and Kathy Najimy. A local performance to check is Carla Lippis’ (pictured) show Brenta’s Bad Thing.

MOZART @ ELDER 1 Elder Hall Wednesday, June 11, 11.30am aso.com.au The Adelaide Symphony Orchestra’s Mozart @ Elder matinee series begins with young Australian conductor Nathan Aspinall opening the run with Mozart’s grand overture to his opera Idomeneo. The ASO’s principal oboist Celia Craig performs Mozart’s Oboe Concerto. Also on the bill is Haydn’s La Poule (The Hen).

presents

MASTERC LASS 3 ★ ELDER HALL NORTH TERRACE THURSD AY 19 JUNE ★ 10:30AM –12PM ★ $10

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established himself as one of the world’s most vibrant and charismatic musicians of his generation. Enquiries and bookings call (08) 8313 5925 Online bookings www.elderhall.adelaide.edu.au

Evenings 2014 CONCERT SEASON

Saturday 14 June 6:30pm and Sunday 15 June 3:00pm Elder Hall, North Terrace

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PRESENTED BY ELDER CONSERVAT ORIUM OF MUSIC

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The evening features Duparc’s exqui au Voyage, Lieder by Richard Strau site L’Invitation songs by Bizet, Sher win’s A Night ss as well as ingale Sang in Berkley Square and more….

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The Governor Hindmarsh Saturday, June 14 shaolinafronauts.com The ARIA-nominated local Afro-beat collective are preparing for their first international tour of Japan and Europe, which includes a spot on the Glastonbury bill. Before that mighty tour, the nine-piece band will launch their new album Follow the Path at the Governor Hindmarsh on Saturday, June 14. Supports include Sparkspitter, Immerman 1.1 and Oisima.

Overture to Rosamunde, D.787 Schubert Clarinet Concertino Weber Symphony No.1 Titan Mahler rium Symphony An historic occasion – Elder Conservatoians on stage! Orchestra with AdYO. Over 100 music special Bring the whole family and enjoy thele) Family Ticket Offer ($60 for 4 peop

adelaide.edu.au

IMAGES: ROSAMUND ILLING; DAVID BARNARD; KEITH CRELLIN OAM; SAMANTHA WEBBER.


28 The Adelaide Review June 2014

PERFORMING ARTS

I Would Talk 500 Miles Former child star Dexter Fletcher discusses jukebox musical Sunshine on Leith, his sophomore offering as director.

by Aimee Knight

THE BABADOOK by DM Bradley

Shot in and around Adelaide, writer/director Jennifer Kent’s feature début, an expansion

of her short Monster, is possibly the best supernatural drama ever made in SA – if, in fact, the dark presence here is properly supernatural. Or is it all in the mind of our psychologically fragile protagonist Amelia, as played by Essie Davis in a brave, deglamourised and dangerous performance.

D

Opening with the dream that’s haunted Amelia since the accidental death of her husband, we follow her early attempts to calm her nervous son Sam (Noah Wiseman), whose increasing and irrational fears keep getting him into more and more trouble. When a mysterious pop-up book (Mister Babadook) appears and Amelia tries reading it to Sam as a bedtime story, its creepy and violent images disturb both of them, and soon she’s tearing the volume up and throwing it away. And yet it returns, with more and more bloodthirsty content, and by this time Amelia has started to believe in the existence of the titular entity (a shadowy figure in a long coat and optional top hat). Soon the house is a mess and her reality is fraying at the seams.

His sophomore offering is Sunshine on Leith, a jukebox musical love story based on the songs of Scotland’s favourite sons The Proclaimers. The film follows soldiers Davy and Ally as they return home to Edinburgh and attempt to assimilate back into everyday life (aided by the power of song).

Strikingly evoking a sense of dread in the most everyday and well-lit places (an aged-care facility, a posh house in an affluent community, a park that looks suspiciously like the Botanic Gardens), Kent’s accomplished effort is built around Davis’ tremendous turn, but Wiseman matches her, making sure we understand that Samuel loves and fears his mum in equal measure. But is the Babadook truly under the bed – or just in their heads? It doesn’t matter as, either way, it’s real.

»»Rated M. The Babadook is in cinemas now

exter Fletcher has paid his dues in front of the camera since age 10. After graduating to grown-up roles in Lock, Stock And Two Smoking Barrels and Band of Brothers, his directorial debut came in 2011 with Cockney crime drama Wild Bill.

Fletcher, born-and-bred a London ragamuffin, reveals the challenges of making a film about Scotland that’s more than just kiltsploitation. “What I tried not to do in the film is labour it with tartan and haggis and kilts and that sort of stuff,” he shares. “I tried to tell a story about people and they just happened to be Scottish. I think hopefully that’s what translates in the film in terms of it can travel to Australia and people still go, ‘I recognise these people and their dilemma and what’s going on’.” Despite its obvious potential to induce some serious seat-squirming, Sunshine on Leith is poignant, relatable and fun. Strong performances are delivered across the cast, which includes UK greats Jane Horrocks and Peter Mullan, and a number of relative newcomers. On working with the younger cast, Fletcher beams – “that was great fun!” He continues, “Young casts for me are always really exciting because I started when I was very young and it was always a bit of a tricky time for me. “The thing with working with child actors is I understand, having been through that

Dexter Fletcher

myself personally. There’s a window where instinct is everything and it’s all fun and it’s all play and you don’t know how good you are and you just go and do what you’re asked. Things can tend to change after that because suddenly everyone goes, ‘Oh, you’re great! You’re a really good actor!’ As a child, you don’t know what that means, and acting is actually very difficult,” he laughs. “But I enjoy immensely working with child actors... I find it very satisfying. I would like to do a film one day with lots of kids in it.” Though he still finds acting ‘fun’ himself, Fletcher has a strong focus on directing now and is currently “looking at a few different projects”. On selecting his next project he says, “It’s about finding a great script and great people to work with and I’m not in any rush to just jump straight into the next film. I want to find exactly the right thing.” This patience served him well in selecting the Sunshine on Leith script, a starkly different offering to his feature debut. His considered, informed approach to directing suggests a versatile filmography still to come from someone who could already be considered a veteran of the industry.

»»Sunshine on Leith is in cinemas now


THE ADELAIDE REVIEW JUNE 2014 29

ADELAIDEREVIEW.COM.AU

CINEMA THE TRIP TO ITALY BY NIGEL RANDALL

Photo: Neil Davidson

There were concerns for an impending screening of The Trip to Italy, Michael Winterbottom’s follow-up to his delicious 2010 gem The Trip. The film’s reformed coupling of Rob Brydon and Steve Coogan playfully ponder early on how sequels are very rarely as good as the original. Cue Godfather reference, Al Pacino impersonation and so on. Was the new film going to contain as many impersonations? Would it slave formulaically to the first? Would there again be scant regard for narrative, the explicit food and scenery porn and most pertinently, would it be as funny? Thankfully, yes on all counts. The familiar scenario is quickly set (Coogan reluctantly accompanies Brydon on a journey through renowned Italian culinary destinations for a review piece he’s writing for Observer’s magazine) and so begins the amusing improvised riffs on Romantic poets, Batman, women, aging and mortality. As they cruise around in their Mini (in homage to The Italian Job and their beloved Michael Caine), listening to Alanis Morissette and partaking in witty jibes and ruminations galore, we follow them from one glorious setting to the next.

The sheer extravagance of the locales they are in, the food that they eat and the hotels in which they stay will have you feeling quite ordinary and envious, especially given Brydon and Coogan seem to barely notice save one or two particularly exquisite views (mostly of the female variety). There is that ever so slight sense of despondency underlying what would otherwise be a shamelessly superficial romp. Is it pointing

to the emptiness of celebrity or the despair of middle age? Perhaps both. What is certain is just how entertaining The Trip to Italy is. Sure those impersonations might start to tire, but there is far too much to be enjoyed in here to let that bother you.

» Rated M. The Trip to Italy is in cinemas now

“...a most impressive piece of filmmaking...” Kenneth Turan, LA Times

FEAR THE MAN W ITH NOTHING LEFT TO LOSE

I N C I N E M A S J U N E 12 East End • Marion • Mitcham • Wallis Mt Barker


30 THE ADELAIDE REVIEW JUNE 2014

VISUAL ARTS

THE NEW BLACK It is close to 40 years since Dorrit Black’s contribution to the story of Australian art was last assessed. BY JOHN NEYLON

I

an North’s monograph, The Art of Dorrit Black, appeared in 1979, four years after Professor North (then Curator of Paintings at the Art Gallery of South Australia) had assembled the artist’s first major museum retrospective. Another Art Gallery curator, Jane Hylton, in her 1989 exhibition (and publication) ADELAIDE ANGRIES: South Australian painting of the 1940s

highlighted Black’s key role in the promotion and consolidation of modernism within the Adelaide art community. More recently Black’s best-known painting, The olive grove, was included in the National Gallery of Australia exhibition Australia, presented at the Royal Academy of Arts, London 2013. Despite this, Black’s contribution to the cause of modern art in Australia and the visual authority of her own art practice has remained unknown or underestimated. Maybe it’s an Adelaide thing, the double-hit of local indifference and an eastern seaboard belief that nothing of real cultural interest occurs west of Ballarat. The most likely explanation is that there are simply not enough Dorrit Blacks in public collections. The considerable number of relief prints in public collections across Australia, being on paper, are never on regular display. Her painting Mirmande (acquired by the Art Gallery of South Australia in 1940) was the only oil painting to be purchased by a public institution in her lifetime. Many of her paintings remain in private hands and inaccessible to the general public. That’s the reality. No show. No know. If the evolving story of Australian modernism is a kind of jigsaw puzzle, then Dorrit Black has remained the key missing piece. Somehow it fell down between the lounge cushions. On the strength of her national prominence as an advocate and artist and her first-hand overseas encounters with mid-war modernist trends, Black deserved to remain front and centre. As a self-conscious creature of the ‘modern age’ she embraced the idea that the artist’s role was to reveal to society a new outlook on life. Her search for progressive artistic ideas led to her to undertake studies, in 1927, at the Grosvenor School of Modern Art, London, where she was inspired by the leading linocut printmaker Claude Flight. The attraction of European modernism then took her to Paris to study forms of analytical painting at André Lhote’s Académie in Montparnasse, then at Lhote’s summer school in Mirmande in southeastern France. Back in Australia and Sydney in 1929, Black set about establishing the Modern Art Centre,

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Dorrit Black, Australia, 1891-1951, Ballet rehearsal, c.1947, Adelaide, oil on canvas board, 55.3 × 38.7 cm. A.M. & A.R. Ragless Bequest Funds 1990, Art Gallery of South Australia, Adelaide

which opened for business in 1931. In doing so she became the first woman to run an art gallery in Australia. The Modern Art Centre (MAC) was the first art institution in Australia to have the word ‘modern’ in its title. Curator

Anne & Gordon Samstag Museum of Art University of South Australia

of Dorrit Black: unseen forces, Tracey LockWeir, notes with satisfaction that the advertised aims of today’s Museum of Contemporary Art (MCA) at Circular Quay mirror those of the MAC over 80 years earlier.

20 – 18 May 2014

Roy Ananda Slow crawl into infinity 11 April – 18 July 2014

Shaun Gladwell: Afghanistan

ry lding, , alle i ve .A G itute Bu ntore A S . A , i t . s K S 0pm R. l 1, In ce & - 4.3 idays e 0 3 . l Lev North T ty i 10 lic Ho i b n-Fr Cnr aide C l : Mo losed Pu s e r d u A o C H m, 0 ery Gall un 1-4p 32 045 A collection of works by R.W. EightyEight S 2 t 8 a S 08 ne: The simplicity, yet complexity of these Pho

1 -15 June 2014 st

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breathtaking pen and ink presentations will surely inspire and amaze. Many people who have seen his work, believe that something exclusive and rare has arrived.

Proudly supported by

55 North Terrace, Adelaide T 8302 0870 Open Tue – Fri 11– 5pm, Sat 2 – 5pm SMA TAR June 14.indd 1

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The Adelaide Review June 2014 31

adelaidereview.com.au

VISUAL ARTS

Dorrit Black, Australia, 1891-1951, Interior with dressing table, c.1942, Magill, Adelaide, oil on canvas, 41.5 × 33.0 cm, Private collection

Dorrit Black, Australia, 1891-1951, Holiday cricket, Burnie Park, c.1949, Sydney, Tasmania or Adelaide, oil on canvas, mounted on board, 58.5 × 39.5 cm, Private collection

Then destiny intervened. Family commitments brought her permanently back to Adelaide in 1935. Here she became an advocate for modern art, particularly by being closely involved in the formation of the Contemporary Art Society in South Australia. In 1940 Black secured a teaching position at the South Australian School of Art and in that capacity inspired a generation of younger artists including Ruth Tuck, Jacqueline Hick and Jeffrey Smart. A tragic car accident in 1951 took her life and robbed the community of the full flowering of her talents.

yourself the courage of an artist who turned her back on an all-too-easy slide from analytical formalism to abstraction. Consider her very wide-ranging travel and work across South Australia. Brace yourself for the visceral impact of the later works. When discussing these, Lock-Weir talks of an ‘awkward beauty’ and rightly so. The sculptural character of these later works, their dark tones, textured surfaces and uncompromising broad-brush statements challenged audiences then and I suspect will continue to do so.

The compelling story of Dorrit Black as an artist, traveller, champion of modernism and foe of conservatism, social activist, theatre designer, inspiring teacher and ‘godmother’ for an emerging generation of artists is recounted in the accompanying publication in extensive detail and with passion by Tracey Lock-Weir and by Elle Freak who contributes an essay on Black’s linocuts. Of particular interest is the inclusion of key texts (letters and poems) that offer glimpses into the artist’s more private thoughts and values, and the flawed relationship between Black and Sydney modernist Grace Crowley, which implies that Black’s disappearing act from the ‘modernism in Australia’ narrative had agendas.

Speculation time. Had Black lived and worked another 10 to 15 years it is possible to imagine that the integrity of her studio practice and her deep sense of connection with the land would have claimed the imagination of new generations of artists and viewing public. For now, sustained by this richly researched and illustrated publication and the rare opportunity to see a lifetime’s work gathered together, we should be very thankful for what we’ve got. ‘Godmother’? My vote is for patron saint.

The art, in the final analysis, is the heart of the matter. Be prepared to delight in the free spirit of the many linocuts. Assess for

»»Dorrit Black: unseen forces Art Gallery of South Australia Saturday, June 14 to Sunday, September 7 artgallery.sa.gov.au


32 The Adelaide Review June 2014

VISUAL ARTS

Miso by Jane Llewellyn

T

he work of Miso (Stanislava Pinchuk) traverses many different creative genres from tattooing to commissions and collaborations with fashion labels such as Chanel and Gorman. But the basis of her work is always drawing and the medium she keeps coming back to is paper.

“It’s something I always come back to instinctively,” Miso explains. “There is something I really love about working with paper. I’m trying to do it in a way that feels contemporary.” To keep the works contemporary she sculpts or chisels back from a blank sheet of paper to form an image. “I like the idea of drawing with nothingness. To me it’s a little more sculptural and challenging than adding mediums onto paper. My work is somewhere between a chiseled sculpture and a drawing.” Although born and raised in Ukraine, Miso now lives a transient lifestyle, travelling a lot for work and living between Melbourne and Tokyo. In a sense these works document and map her journeys, forming a diary of where she has been. “All the works are about memory and mapping across different memory experiences. I feel like it’s quite apt, documenting ephemeral experiences with nothingness. It has always been quite a nice fit for the things I have been interested in making work about.” This latest exhibition at Hugo Michell Gallery, titled Metabolism, tells the story of two cities, Tokyo and Kiev, Tokyo coming together and Kiev coming apart. Miso explains: “ Metabolism is a term a lot of urbanists and architects use and basically it’s similar to the biological process – it’s about how quickly a city metabolises its own people. How quickly

main town square, and maps of the violence in Kiev are dispersed in the shards of glass.

Youthscape 2014 22 June – 13 July 2014 A Prize Exhibition open to all young artists 15 - 26 years Over $5,000 in Prizes over all mediums Four categories, 2D, Photography, 3D & Printmaking.

Where: RSASA Gallery, Level 1, Institute Bldg, Cnr North Tce & Kintore Ave, Adelaide. Mon – Friday 10.30 – 4.00pm, Sat & Sun 1 – 4.00pm. Closed public holidays.

Self Portrait by Jennifer Allnutt, (Overall Winner Youthscape 2012)

ROYAL SOUTH AUSTRALIAN SOCIETY OF ARTS INC.

Youthscape 2014 22 June – 13 July 2014 Open to all young artists 15 - 26 years Over $5,000 in Prizes over all mediums Entries now due 6th June 2014 Entry forms www.rsasarts.com.au

For more information: Bev Bills, Director, RSASA Office: 8232 0450 or 0415 616 900.

Royal South Australian Society of Arts Inc. Level 1 Institute Building, Cnr North Terrace & Kintore Ave Adelaide, Ph/Fax: 8232 0450 www.rsasarts.com.au rsasarts@bigpond.net.au Mon- Fri 10.30-4.30pm Sat & Sun 1- 4pm Pub Hol. Closed.

it fluctuates and rebuilds and transforms, and how people come together and come apart.” With a civil war brewing in Ukraine these works are a personal response to a tyranny of distance – watching happenings from afar and not being able to go back. “The whole show is told across two strands of work that will hang opposite each other and mirror each other.” On the Tokyo side there are works of spiderwebs resembling city structures with train stations and streets woven into the fabric of the web. It shows Tokyo growing together – metabolising. Opposite this is a drawing of shattered glass which is the exact same size and looks the same from a distance. When you get up close it is actually maps of the Maidan, Kiev’s

For Miso, whose transient lifestyle means she is quite minimalist, the works she produces are, for the moment at least, a physical documentation of a memory. “They make the ephemeral something physical again. But also in a really nice way because they are bought and go to people’s homes so have their own journey from me and I end up with nothing again. It’s a really interesting flux to be in. I really like that.”

»»Miso: Metabolism Hugo Michell Gallery Thursday, June 5 to Saturday, July 5 m-i-s-o.com


The Adelaide Review June 2014 33

adelaidereview.com.au

A-Z Contemporary Art

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Helpful hints on how to make your art say NOW. Plus ARTSPEAK Bonus Pack by John Neylon

I = INSTALLATION Sulo-Specific (or homage to Yoko Ono) On bin night run down the street and push over every Sulo bin. Take photographs but keep running. Post images on your blog and justify the action with rant about mindless consumerism. Larking Be warned. Making installation art can become meaningless. A change of routine may be required. Consider the following. In 1996 the Italian artist Maurizio Cattelan stole the entire contents of the Galerie Bloom in Amsterdam (including arts, fax machines and filing cabinets) and then exhibited them as his own work in another gallery, De Appel, under the title Another Fucking Readymade. Curators at De Appel classified the act as one of ‘appropriation’. The lesson is clear. When faced with the banality of installation routines, lighten up a little and give your fellow artists’ sense of humour a work out. Welcome to my psyche Hang out your unwashed hang-ups in public and watch the ghouls gather around. You’ll need a stock of symbols. Some suggestions: bananas = erotic desire, beanbag = mother, cricket stumps = father, piano accordion = irrational hatred, Barbie doll = unrequited desire, single shoe = loneliness. The fun starts when you bring all these together. A metaphoric structure such as totemic column, womb-like enclosure, box, maze, cage, shaft or void will massage meaning like you wouldn’t believe. For inspiration check out the Cell series of Louise Bourgeois. There is a lot of fear and pain going down here, so approach with caution. And watch out for spiders.

ARTSPEAK Irony The irony of it is that Andy Warhol, who said that art is whatever you can get away with, actually did. Or was he being ironical? Identity Most contemporary art has some association with identity. Apparently they are all made by individual identities. This has led to a lot of problems because everyone has a different identity. This can be rectified by refusing to make eye contact on a train. But in the ‘ideologically charged site’ of the art museum this is not an option. Is identity politics the art of refusing to blink? Imagination “I reflect with delight how little a mere theory…interferes with the process of poetic imagination in a man of true poetic genius.” S.T. Coleridge Jaws of Hell, Canberra, 2014. Photo: John Neylon.

Risk Audience passivity can be avoided by introducing risk. No one on encountering Richard Wilson’s 20:50 installation at the Saatchi Gallery, London, could honestly claim to be completely at ease. Visitors were required to ‘wade’ waist deep in a pool of oil, reassured only by repeated Buddhist mantras (or Hail Marys) that it was only an illusion. Complete darkness can achieve similar heightened levels of anxiety at a fraction of the cost. If this darkness involves a maze, ensure that attendants are equipped with torches to locate the source of the sobbing.

Alan Kaprow. But it’s a crowded field. Check out Joseph Beuys’ blanket-chomping Coyote: I like America and America likes me, the First International Dada Fair of 1920 (lots of proto-Installation art), Robert Rauschenberg’s ‘stuffed goat’ Monogram, Kurt Schwitters’ Merzbau (complete with a pair of fellow artist Moholy-Nagy’s socks) and outdoor text installations by Jenny ‘awful punishment awaits really bad people’ Holzer. Any aspirant installation artist would do well to check out the historical competition. Nothing worse than looking like a late 20th century appropriationist.

Intensify site-specificity by filling gallery floor spaces with ‘attitude’ materials such as broken bricks or ball bearings. Put some effort into interpretive panels which talk up art as a journey not a destination. Apply related texts with a poultice to sprained ankles.

Install an Oz The globalisation of installation art has created a pan-international blandness to the whole affair. Perhaps it’s time to give it another Down Under spin? Those stubby-short sporting,

Start up installation trope check (if still stuck for an idea) Strew - that’s right just strew things (think teenager’s bedroom), Corners – just stuff anything/everything into the corners (don’t ask why, it just works), Analogue TVs – you have to love that blue glow and audio hiss) The Veil– cheap and easy to install, creates false hope of something interesting about to appear), The Vitrine – the Queen Bee of installation devices (see Veil).

Think big Most installations don’t think outside the white cube. The artists who designed and built Stonehenge were big thinkers. But you don’t need 20-ton chunks of sarsen stone to make your point. We’ve previously discussed the advantages of inflatables and fiberglass molding at a pinch. The real challenge is to find something to say. An underwater homage to Stonehenge using submerged shipping containers could be a neat way of making a big global warming statement. As always you are only limited by your imagination. Who’s to blame? Someone must be responsible for the installation craze. It’s easy to point the finger at high profile suspects such as the ‘happening’

KINK Oil Bottle designed and made using traditional glass blowing techniques

Available online and in-store now! www.jamfactory.com.au

6 - 29 June 2014 THREE EXHIBITIONS

MEET THE ARTISTS 2pm, Sun15 June

 New Life mixed media by Annika Robertson

exhibitions gallery shop

Laura Ashley skirt twirling earth artists at the Mildura Sculpture Triennial in the 60s and 70s had eucalyptus oil running in their veins. Just give them a handful of sticks, some cocky feathers and a pile of stones and they were away. So could you. Remember the Buzz Off.

 Once upon a time ... paintings & drawings by Sue Morizzi

A chance to talk to the artists from all three exhibitions in a relaxed & informal atmosphere

 Hacienda encaustic works by Sheila Whittam

FREE ENTRY ALL WELCOME

Annika Robertson

Sue Morizzi

Sheila Whittam

Gallery M Marion Cultural Centre 287 Diagonal Rd Oaklands Park SA P: 08 8377 2904 E: info@gallerym.net.au

www.gallerym.net.au


34 The Adelaide Review June 2014

VISUAL ARTS

Taking it to the Streets

While screen printing was an old technique, this new wave of political printmaking was pushing it into a new era. Martin explains, “We wanted to use photographic imagery and handdrawn stencils and texts. We wanted to use the skills they use in newspapers and media but in an art context for street posters and prints.” Ann Newmarch, who was also a member of PAM and has work in the exhibition, says, “It was a busy time, great things were happening and it needs to happen again. It’s the right time for it. We have so many things to say now that we need to get young people interested in working with these ideas.”

by Jane Llewellyn

I

t’s an interesting time to revisit the Flinders University Art Museum’s collection of political prints and posters from the 70s and 80s. It’s 40 years since the 1974 month-long occupation of the University’s registry building, and students are again taking to the streets to protest against the Abbott Government’s Budget, particularly changes to tertiary education. Mother Nature is a Lesbian looks back at some of the most significant print work from the era and it is surprising how relevant many of these issues still are today.

The title for the exhibition, Mother Nature is a Lesbian, comes from a poster produced by the AFPC. “It really stood out to me. I really loved it and thought it spoke on behalf of everything in the show,” says Detorre. The members of the AFPC never really saw themselves as artists, they just wanted to make comments about things that were happening at the time. “We never imagined our work would be exhibited or collected because we weren’t artists. Our work was plastered in the streets and community centres. We were completely blown away by being represented in this exhibition,” says Sally O’Wheel, member of the AFPC.

“I think a huge amount of the themes and ideas in the works really resonate today with current issues,” says curator Celia Detorre. It was a prolific period of production of political prints and posters and a lot of the works in the collection are from South Australia. “I wanted

Andrew Hill, Great expectations, 1986, serigraph, colour inks on paper, 102.1 x 73.1 cm, Equipment fund 1985,

TREE OF LIGHT An exhibition of mixed media by Audrey Emery

FUAM 2274, courtesy the artist.

The exhibition not only celebrates the art of printmaking but documents the important political and social issues of the time, some of which still resonate today.

Summer Light and Form, Monoprint

6 – 27 June 2014

Opens: Friday 6 June 6 pm Launch Guest: Steve Meredith, Former Education Manager, Adelaide Botanic Gardens Meet and Share with Audrey Saturday 7, 14,and 21 June 1 pm - 4 pm Artist Talks and Demonstrations by Audrey Saturday 7 June 2 pm - 3 pm Scherenschnitte - paper cutting and mixed media Saturday 14 June 2 pm - 3 pm Printmaking - lino cut and mono prints Saturday 21 June 2 pm - 3 pm Pastel drawing

to present the prints in a new way and it was my decision to look at the contribution of South Australian artists, and artists working in Adelaide at that time, to the genre of political printmaking internationally,” explains Detorre. During this time, a number of collectives were being formed, like the Progressive Art Movement (PAM), Women’s Art Movement (WAM) and the Anarchist Feminist Poster Collective (AFPC) where like-minded individuals came together to address the big issues like American cultural imperialism,

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women’s liberation, the Vietnam War, and to support the working class struggle. There was a great sense of community surrounding the printmaking process, which came about through a need to access technology and share skills and resources. “One thing that is really interesting coming into this show is how much technology has changed. One of the reasons we all knew each other or came together in one way or another is that we had to share technology,” explains artist and member of PAM, Mandy Martin.

»»Mother Nature is a Lesbian Political Printmaking in South Australia 1970s-1980s Flinders University City Gallery Continues until Sunday, July 13 flinders.edu.au/artmuseum »»Presented in conjunction with: POSTERED: Adelaide Tooth and Nail Gallery Continues until Friday, June 13


The Adelaide Review June 2014 35

adelaidereview.com.au

VISUAL ARTS

Jump Cuts Contemporary takes on the Art Gallery of South Australia’s collections

by JOHN NEYLON

M

erric Boyd’s Koala bowl, 1935 talks to Gerry Wedd’s Cheshire Koala, 2014.

An interstate trip to Melbourne is never complete without a pause for a cup of tea in the towering presence of the Big Koala, at Dadswells Bridge northwest of Stawell. If ever there is a reminder of the hypnotic power this lovable marsupial has on the Australian psyche then here it is, all 12 tonnes of it. Nowhere is this more apparent than in the world of the souvenir trade and the kitchen, lounge and garden décor. Gone but not forgotten is the bronzed twin koala ashtray, the koala letterbox and the koala tomato sauce dispenser. Merric Boyd, the ‘father of Australian studio pottery’ is an example of how Australians’ mid war nationalism found expression in a demand for Australiana, particularly decorative ware. Art pottery of the period unashamedly fed this demand by churning out bush flora and fauna ware. But Merric was different. The ceramics he created (assisted by his wife Doris) at Murrumbeena, across the 1920s had a distinctive personality and convincing sculptural presence. They featured bushland elements such as trees, limbs and branches populated by creatures, especially the koala. Koala bowl (1932) in the collection of the Art Gallery of South Australia is an excellent example of Boyd’s use of strong rhythmical elements to convey a sense of koalas perched on windswept boughs. The naïve qualities of Merric’s folk pottery continue to hold

strong appeal. Similar comments can be made about South Australian artist Gerry Wedd’s ceramics that embody the endearing qualities of timeless folk ceramics, with a contemporary and often edgy twist. His more recent hand-built blue and white ware with its unsettling conjunctions of wistful humour and mordant social observation has redefined his practice.

Merric Boyd, potter, Doris Boyd, decorator, Koala Bowl, 1932, Art Gallery of South Australia

We approach it now with some wariness, not sure of what the joke is or even if it’s meant to be funny. Cheshire Koala (2014) is a one of a series of ‘Alice pieces’ produced for the recent BMG Art exhibition Through the Mirror Ball. In these miniature sculptures Wedd was reflecting in part on Meissen porcelain dessert figurines and their poorer cousins, earthenware Staffordshire figurines sold as nick-knacks at fairs. Recontextualised into the 21st century, such items, for Wedd, skirt the area of kitsch. His koala is clearly referencing Lewis Carroll’s Cheshire Cat. Given the Antipodean world in which Alice found herself in Wonderland it was understandable that she was perplexed by a grin without a cat. To European eyes and imaginations everything Down Under just didn’t make sense. Wedd’s koala, unlike Merric Boyd’s compliant, if appealing, little creatures, is clearly in control and grins at the thought. Koalas rule!

Gerry Wedd, Cheshire Koala, 2014

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36 The Adelaide Review June 2014

VISUAL ARTS

Profile: Zoe Kirkwood by Jane Llewellyn

Z

oe Kirkwood’s multi-faceted installation works are dazzling audiences both locally and interstate. Graduating with Honours last year from the University of South Australia, Kirkwood’s career has taken off, with the artist picking up a swag of prizes and exhibition opportunities in the first half of the year. There are no signs yet of things slowing down.

Forming the basis of Kirkwood’s work is a preoccupation with the Baroque and in particular the bel composto theory the unification of painting, sculpture and architecture, which underpins the work of the great Baroque artist Gian Lorenzo Bernini. Reflecting the opulence and extravagance of the Baroque, Kirkwood uses Bernini’s idea of bringing these elements together but in a contemporary way. Kirkwood’s installations contain several different elements including painting, sculpture and wood turning and in the spirit of the bel

composto she finds balance through these parts working together. Kirkwood explains, “It’s a symbiotic relationship, each element informs another.” Kirkwood’s installations are an expansion of her painting practice. “I did my entire undergraduate degree doing nothing but painting and drawing. Then going back and doing Honours was when I started looking at this idea of taking paintings off walls and bringing them out into space,” she explains. The kaleidoscopic installations create a sense of engagement and draw the viewer in. “My work is very much about the audience. It’s designed to encapsulate the audience and to invade their space in a way.” Kirkwood’s use of bold, bright colours adds to this. “I work with signwriter’s paint so it’s visually supposed to capture your eyes.” While Kirkwood’s deliberate choice of a bright colour palette highlights the importance of colour in the Baroque period, the exhibition at FELTspace will actually be all white. It’s an experiment for Kirkwood who wants to

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continue to push the boundaries of her practice. “I am really looking forward to it because to be honest I am not sure how it’s going to turn out.” Another area Kirkwood is experimenting with is the use of kinetic elements in her work. The installation at CACSA included moving sculptures that were incredibly effective and Kirkwood wants to take this further by bringing it in to her paintings. Overall Kirkwood hopes audiences get a sense of enjoyment from her work. “Some of the elements are quite playful,” she says. “I don’t think there is anything wrong with people just enjoying art.”

»»White Out FELTspace Thursday, June 5 to Saturday, June 21 Hugo Michell Gallery Thursday, June 5 to Saturday, July 5 zoekirkwood.blogspot.com.au

Zoe Kirkwood, Let them eat cake (detail).

Amanda Radomi, Holding me up, acrylic on canvas, 90x90cm

A standout at this year’s Helpmann Academy Graduate exhibition, Kirkwood presented her work The Neo-Baroque Spectacle and picked up three awards. She was then selected in Hatched: National Graduate Show 2014, held at the Perth Institute of Contemporary Art (PICA), where she was awarded the 2014 Doctor Harold Schenberg Art Prize of $35,000. Last month her work Enter Excess: Space Invaders occupied the project space at the Contemporary Art Centre of South Australia (CACSA) and this month her work will be exhibited at both FELTspace and Hugo Michell Gallery.


The Adelaide Review June 2014 37

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VISUAL ARTS

Film Festival Moving Image Partnership Evolves The Adelaide Film Festival’s (AFF) moving image commission will have a national focus from next year, as two interstate galleries have partnered with the biennial festival and the Samstag Museum.

by David Knight

T

he commission, which traditionally has been a partnership between the AFF and Samstag, from next year will include Sydney’s Carriageworks and the University of Western Australia Cultural Precinct. The partnership means the commission will travel nationally in 2016 after premiering at Samstag on North Terrace in 2015.

“There aren’t that many arts commissions for original work for Australian artists, especially for them to create work that is screen-based and none of them, to my knowledge, guarantee a national tour,” Duthie explains to The Adelaide Review. “It’s coming from a fantastic and unique place anyway – that a film festival collaborates with an art gallery and a museum space – and this time we will times it by three and evolve it.” The 2015-commissioned artist will receive $50,000 to develop their work. “We’ve had a fantastic three-round partnership with Samstag, where the work gets commissioned and obviously premieres in Adelaide,” Duthie says. “That’s been fantastic, working with great artists like Lynette Wallworth, Warwick Thornton and Daniel Crooks, I love working with Erica [Green] and Samstag. Erica and myself have both admired and respected Lisa Havilah and her curatorial vision for Carriageworks in Sydney and the same for Ted Snell at the University of Western Australia. We think they are adventurous, audacious and great programmers and curators and we know they both support Australian art and new commissions. Now, we’ve got a fantastic new project for the Adelaide Film

Festival that is also a three-city national tour for an Australian artist.” Applications for the 2015 commission are now open. Samstag Director Erica Green says the national tour not only puts Adelaide on the map but enables wider critical debate about the nexus between art and film. “By extending the partnership to include Carriageworks and Lawrence Wilson Gallery [at the University of WA], the commissions have increased national visibility, which is good for the artists’ profile and promoting the commissions, but most importantly extending the partnerships enables wider critical debate around that very dynamic nexus between art and film. The 2015 AFF will be Duthie’s second at the helm of the biennial festival. Looking back on last year’s AFF, the former ABC Head of Arts and Entertainment says the results from the investment fund slate, which includes the HIVE program, were extraordinary, as films such as 52 Tuesdays, Charlie’s Country, The Darkside and Tracks received national and international acclaim, including Sundance and Berlin Film Festival awards for 52 Tuesdays while David Gulpilil won a best actor award at Cannes for Charlie’s Country. “One couldn’t have asked for more, in terms of the projects from the investment slate, it was fantastic.”

2014

AFF CEO and Festival Director Amanda

Duthie (pictured) says next year’s three-city national moving image tour is a fantastic new project for the AFF.

Amanda Duthie

Duthie hopes the AFF will become an annual event, as it “makes sense in terms of the natural cycles of festivals but also screen productions.” The commissioned artist will be announced later this year.

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38 The Adelaide Review June 2014

TRAVEL

Fire and Frenzy The Chaos of Las Fallas by Grant Millls

I

’ve somehow found myself on a bus with 50 other people, a brass band and a troupe of drummers. Everyone is laughing and doing what they can to dance. One drummer, who I’m hip-to-hip with, is gesticulating at me wildly and spitting quick-fire Spanish. Eventually he identifies my ignorance, grabs my hand and clamps it down on his head so that he can continue to drum away despite the lurching of the bus. In the back there is a seven-foot polystyrene sculpture of German Chancellor, Angela Merkel, dressed as a quasi-Nazi Mary Poppins – the swastika of her red arm band replaced with the symbol of the euro… And this is only my first day at Valencia’s bizarre Las Fallas

festival. There are still four more days to come. Las Fallas might just be the world’s most spectacle-rich festival; it is wild and frenzied and not for the faint of heart. The celebration centres around the ‘fallas’, huge multi-story sculptures – made of carved and painted polystyrene – that are erected by each district of the city. Because of the lightness of their material, the most expensive of these fallas – often erected

by the richest districts – can rise up to 15 metres tall with impossible cascades of figures executed with a staggering level of artistry. These monuments become a hub for each community’s celebration of the festival, bringing people together for five days of communal eating, dancing and shooting the breeze long into the night. Over 350 of these fallas are built, turning the whole of Valencia and its suburbs into one continuous party. During Las Fallas you can walk a block in any direction and you’re likely to run into another of these exquisitely detailed sculptures surrounded by yet another street party. In the shadow of these incredible monuments the rest of the festival whirls with impromptu music, buskers, and parades. The Valencians indulge their love of explosions by arming every child over the age of two years with an incredible array of firecrackers and the freedom to let them off with wilful abandon. The City Council of Valencia stokes this pyromaniacal streak by funding midday fireworks, known as ‘Mascletà’ or ‘sound fireworks’, every day for the three weeks leading up to and during the festival. At 2pm without fail, the Plaza del Ayuntamiento fills with tens of thousands of locals and tourists for the day’s Mascletà. All work in buildings around the plaza ceases as people cram into their office windows and line up on their apartment roofs to witness a display that is little more than a sound and smoke show.

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As Las Fallas builds to its unforgettable conclusion, many local districts even put on their own morning Mascletà in order to wake up their constituents to another day of partying. The result is that you can effectively see fireworks shows morning, noon and night.

Las Fallas concludes with the event known as La Cremà. On the last night, after five days of non-stop explosions, drinking and dancing around the hulking monuments of the fallas there is only one thing left to do: burn them all. In the space of only a few hours, every one of the 350 fallas around the city goes up in flames, risking city-wide incineration. All across Valencia, hundreds of firemen work to keep the flames from igniting the houses of the town’s narrow medieval streets. Each takes only seconds to catch alight and barely a minute to become a towering whirlwind of flame leaping 30 or 40 metres into the air. Stand too close – even as close as the barriers erected to keep you out – and you’ll feel your skin blistering. The air becomes thick with the acrid smoke of burning polystyrene and a toxic haze settles over the city as workmen immediately descend on the smouldering piles of ash and blackened, wooden skeletons of their fallas. And by tomorrow morning it will all be as if nothing had ever happened. After five days of the constant noise, Valencia suddenly becomes supernaturally quiet. People file home, spent – or perhaps appeased – for another year. Las Fallas is an incredible and inexplicable devotion to fire and fun. It is unpredictable, unnerving and completely unlike anything you have seen before. If you plan on visiting keep your wits, and a set of earplugs, about you.

»»Las Fallas culminates on March 19 every year, with the majority of events occurring in the five days prior. »»Visit One-Small-World.com for more information on Europe’s strange festivals fallasfromvalencia.com/en


THE ADELAIDE REVIEW JUNE 2014 39

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FOOD.WINE.COFFEE My Own Private Patio BY DEREK CROZIER

T

here is a coffee drying method widely used around the world where the raw coffee beans are made into thin rows on large cement patios. The coffee is dried by the sun and is shifted every 30 to 40 minutes over six to 14 days. This method was inspiration for the name Patio Coffee Roasters and I believe it is also a symbol of patience, which is what’s needed when brewing, extracting and pouring the perfect coffee. The boutique was full of toys and tools to make coffee enthusiasts feel like a kid in a candy store. The shelves were full of different beans with various characteristics but it was the Synesso coffee machine on the counter that was ready to make my day. The barista suggested I start with an espresso of Panama Boquete from Maunier Estate. It had a rounded grapefruit acidity that lingered in the mouth and started to sweeten as I sipped on. I ordered the house blend called Compton St for my latte. Made up of beans from Brazil,

Colombia, India, Guatemala and Papua New Guinea, it was presented with a symmetrical rosetta on top as the art and the taste was clean and bright with a hint of malt. The Tweedvale milk was textured beautifully and created an excellent mouthfeel throughout. Patio Coffee Roasters is like a cellar door for the coffee scene and caters to all areas of the industry. They roast their coffee in-house and do all sorts of training onsite. If you feel that your skills are drying up or you would like to start the day right, then come and hang out on this patio for a relaxing coffee and a chat.

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40 THE ADELAIDE REVIEW JUNE 2014

FOOD.WINE.COFFEE

REVIEW:

HANUMAN BY PAUL WOOD

T

he location of this extension of Chef Jimmy Shu’s national restaurant empire seems a little strange. South Terrace hotels are not the most inspirational of Adelaide’s accommodation, and the Grand Chifley Hotel’s dated exterior and tired entrance lobby doesn’t give a good first impression when entering the restaurant sited just opposite the reception desk. Moving through the refurbished dining space is a little more rousing but even a fresh coat of paint and some Danish-style imported furniture can’t help you shake the feeling that you’re about to dive into the hotel’s weekly buffet special. The idea of ‘views over the hotel pool’ would usually add a touch of grandeur, if only the pool wasn’t surrounded by chunky white plastic furniture overshadowed only by the unpleasant façades of nearby buildings. We can’t always choose our neighbours, I suppose.

We arrive during a very quiet lunch hour, confirming that although the location may help keep the overheads down and be convenient for after-hours parking it is not attracting the daytime crowd of more centrally-based dining haunts. Only one other table is occupied and the food and beverage staff seem a little surprised when we arrive, continuing to set tables rather than show us to one. After a little confusion we are seated and service picks up, with menus and wine landing promptly and some menu suggestions offered by the staff and accepted by us; their knowledge of the dishes gave reassurance that we made a good choice and were in for a gastronomic treat from across the seas. Six little tapered earthenware lids surround a pool of lime and chilli sauce, each one hiding a succulent seafood surprise. Lifting the lid reveals fresh oysters swimming in a subtly

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THE ADELAIDE REVIEW JUNE 2014 41

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FOOD.WINE.COFFEE sweet and slightly spicy liquid. Simple and delicious. This is Hanuman’s signature dish, and one that I’d happily eat by the dozen. Lingering tastes of lemongrass and ginger get the taste buds dancing and the heat from the chilli is enough to notice but not to undermine the oyster’s delicate flesh. The first sign of the Indian influence to the Hanuman menu comes next: a Kashmiri chicken tikka marinated with yogurt, ginger and Kashmiri chilli, balanced thoughtfully with a fragrant rose petal garam masala. I imagine that better can only be tasted alongside views of the Himalayan mountains, and this dish is best eaten dunked in the minted yogurt and wrapped in the most delicious roti bread served alongside. It’s here that you really begin to realise that with food like this as the focus, interior (and exterior) design struggles of this oriental haven can be forgiven (even the preformed sandstone deities that I just noticed lining the purple fluorescent lit walls). It is a difficult challenge to make a curry look photo-worthy but the duck, roasted then simmered in a coconut and red curry sauce, infused with kaffir lime leaf and Thai basil and topped with a sprig of a chilli bush, makes this one the exception, and dare I say it kind of ‘cute’. Strike a pose, you delicious looking dish. Delicious tasting too. Large chunks of

pineapple and lychees sweeten the flavour and while perhaps could be seen as a little common, there is nothing like a good classic that is executed well – especially when served with a lemongrass martini, it was past noon, after all. Less attractive, but still on the mark with flavour and balance, is a combined seafood dish, wok-tossed and seasoned with hot basil and oyster sauce. Lovely and succulent scallops are the heroes here, with the delightful sauce greedily mopped up with leftover roti – both of these too good to waste. Hanuman is decidedly the best house on the worst street based on its culinary delights. Fresh, fragrant and exciting dishes meld Asian cuisines in perfect cohesion; it’s just a shame about the view.

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42 The Adelaide Review June 2014

FOOD.WINE.COFFEE

Food for Thought

Wild Mushroom Quiche Talk to your greengrocer on how to clean your mushrooms but as a general rule don’t let them come in contact with large amounts of water. Ingredients • Sour cream or shortcrust pastry • 1 brown onion • 100g smoked bacon – thinly sliced • 1 garlic clove • 200g porcini, slippery Jacks or pine mushrooms • 3 sprigs thyme • 6 large free-range eggs • 2 free-range egg yolks • 150g sour cream • 100ml milk • Flat leaf parsley – finely chopped • Salt and pepper • 100g goat’s milk fetta – cubed

Mushrooms BY Annabelle Baker

T

hey are full of flavour, come in many different shapes and sizes and range from one of the cheapest ingredients in the world to what is considered the diamond of the kitchen. The fungi family is a large one and includes a diverse selection of commercially grown and locally foraged wild varieties. Although we see mushrooms on the shelves all year long, they do in fact have a short but abundant season when picked from the local pine forests. The first autumn rains, combined with the lingering sun of summer, create damp and humid pockets that incubate the spores left behind from the season before. You can find locally foraged mushrooms from good greengrocers and farmers’ markets.

It is the nutty and meaty flavour of mushrooms that keeps me coming back for more. With a large selection of ‘flavour enhancers’ on the market claiming to be real flavour, I often wonder, ‘Why not just use real food?’ Mushrooms, like tomatoes and Parmesan cheese are full of natural forming monosodium glutamate (MSG). Naturally occurring glutamate has low sodium content, unlike its commercial counterpart. A casserole, soup or pie mix is instantly made richer with the addition of perfectly sautéed mushrooms. When it comes to bold – the pungent flavour and aroma of the truffle is hard to beat. Found beneath the base of a select variety of trees, it is

possibly the most prized mushroom of them all. The Australian season for black truffles is from early winter to late August and we can’t seem to get enough of them! Black truffles (like me) love carbs; grated through buttery mashed potato, over fresh pasta or a baked potato with rich sour cream only makes them more desirable. But for the ultimate indulgence; generously butter two slices of sourdough bread, line with thick slices of Gruyère cheese and sandwich slices of black truffle in the middle of it all. Wrap and leave for 24 hours before toasting in

a frying pan and serving hot with a glass wine. Full of flavour and sometimes overlooked by us all, these little gems hold a lot more power in the kitchen than we give them credit for. Whether it is the addition of the humble button mushroom or the extravagant truffle, the meaty, earthy and somewhat nutty characteristics will never disappoint in the kitchen.

Method 1. Preheat the oven to 180 degrees. 2. Lightly grease a large tart tin with a removable base. 3. Place the tin over the sheet of pastry and trim to be a circle, allowing for the depth of the tin. (Be generous with the circle to allow for shrinkage whilst baking) 4. Line the pastry with a sheet of baking paper and fill with dried chickpeas, rice or baking weights. 5. Bake for 15 minutes. 6. Remove the baking paper and weights. Return to the oven for five minutes to slightly brown the base of the tart. 7. Heat a dash of olive oil in a frying pan and over a medium to high heat and sauté the onions until translucent. 8. Add a peeled garlic clove that has been smashed with a back of a knife. 9. Slice the bacon into thick pieces and with the sprigs of thyme add them to the pan, cook until the bacon is crispy and all the fat has been rendered. 10. Thinly slice the mushrooms and discard any woody stalks. 11. Increase the heat and add the mushrooms, fry until golden and cooked through. 12. Leave to cool to room temperature. 13. In a large bowl whisk the eggs, egg yolks, sour cream, milk, parsley with a large pinch of salt and pepper. 14. Place an even layer of the cooked mushroom mixture to the bottom of the blind-baked tart shell. 15. Pour over the egg mixture (place the tart shell on the oven shelf if you are nervous about transporting it full). 16. Gently place the cubed goats cheese around the tart. 17. Bake for 30 to 40 minutes or until just set in the middle. 18. Leave to cool for 30 minutes before serving.

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THE ADELAIDE REVIEW JUNE 2014 43

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HOT100

2014 HOT 100 SA WINES

W

ith many months of planning already under our belt, The Adelaide Review is excited to launch the 2014/15 season of the Hot 100 SA Wines with some exciting changes, which includes fresh judges and wine classes, as well as a new Chief Judge – Banjo Harris Plane. Harris Plane has been part of the Hot 100 team for the last two years as a judge and this year the Attica Manager and Sommelier steps up to be the Chief Judge for 2014/15. The Hot 100 winners will be announced on Thursday, October 30 at the Queen’s Theatre. We will also launch the Hot 100 SA Wines

publication at this event. The Adelaide Review will release a limited number of tickets for the public to purchase for the first time in the event’s history for the Queen’s Theatre soiree. The ticket price includes all tastings, canapés, entertainment and a unique opportunity to meet the Top 10 winemakers of 2014. Tickets will be available to purchase via adelaidereview. com.au from Friday, May 30.

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The Jam Factory will announce its Drink. Dine. Design emerging artist award at the launch. The Adelaide Review is a proud partner of this exciting award for the second year running.

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Queens’ Theatre Hot 100 awards and publication launch: Thursday, October 30

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44 THE ADELAIDE REVIEW JUNE 2014

HOT100

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Functions including business meetings, Christmas parties and special celebrations comprising birthdays, baptisms, anniversaries and weddings are fully catered for. Whatever your gastronomic indulgence may be, from a casual breakfast through to fine dining, you will find it in this corner of the CDB.

T

he Adelaide Review Hot 100 SA Wines show brings together a mass of wine and restaurant industry talent from around Australia. Now in its eight year, our mission is to shine a spotlight on the cultural diversity and wealth of gastronomic culture endemic across the state, through the lens of wines that showcase drinkability, authenticity and soul. The show will enrich the vinous landscape of the state by exposing its existing charms to those who work amongst it, as well as those from interstate. It’s a celebration of the state, viewed through the expression of wines from across its length and breadth – wines that show the diversity of the state, its past, its present and a glimpse, perhaps, at its future. Put together unlike any other wine show in this country, as wines are assessed not in groupings according to their variety but rather in terms of style – the weight, texture and impact of the wine are the common factors across the classes. We believe this pushes winemakers to consider the place of their wines in a broad spectrum, as well as looking into why their wines taste the way they do – not simply due to their varietal composition.

This radical-to-some-but-commonsense-toothers approach fits perfectly with the zeitgeist of the modern Australian wine industry, and encapsulates the freethinking and creative spirit that is imbuing vignerons across the state of South Australia right now. We will undertake a week of wine tasting surrounded by food and music – the natural habitat for wine. The inimitable Duncan Welgemoed from Bistro Dom will contribute victuals for the week and ensure our judges are well fed. The JamFactory will host guests for a stunning introduction to some of the state’s creative flair. The top 100 wines will make it through to the Hot 100 SA Wines publication and the winning wine’s producer will be awarded return flights for two to anywhere in the world thanks to Singapore Airlines. Winners will be announced on Thursday, October 30 at the launch party held in the Queen’s Theatre. After years of tireless work to establish the Hot 100 as the most forward thinking and progressive show of the wine judging circuit, James Erskine has stepped aside. It is my pleasure and honour to take the reins from him, and his fine work will be carried on with pride.

LIST OF JUDGES: •Banjo Harris Plane, Chief Judge: Manager and Sommelier, Attica (VIC) •Mike Bennie: Wine Journalist Gourmet Traveller and Wine Front (NSW) •Ned Goodwin MW: Asian Brand Ambassador for Charles Heidsieck and Master of Wine (NSW) •Gil Gordon-Smith: WSET Lecturer and Educator, Winemaker (SA) •Peter Dredge: Winemaker, Bay of Fires (TAS) •Tristan Habeck: Wine Distributor, Whole Bunch Wines (NSW) •Vanessa Altmann: Winemaker, Switch Wines (SA) •Patrick Sullivan: Winemaker, Patrick Sullivan and Thousand Candles (VIC) •Derek Hooper: Winemaker, Cape Jaffa (SA) •Taras Ochota: Winemaker, Ochota Barrels, (SA) •Brendon Keys: Winemaker, BK Wines (SA) •Brad Hickey: Winemaker, Brash Higgins (SA) •Andrea Frost: Wine Journalist and Author (VIC) •Roger Haden: Manager, Educational Leadership, Le Cordon Bleu (SA) •Pablo Theodorous: Wine Distributor and Manager, East End Cellars (SA) •Sharon Romeo: Owner/Operator, Fino (SA) •Sebastian Crowther MS: Wine Buyer, China Group and Master Sommelier (NSW) •Katrina Birchmeir: Owner/Operator, Garagistes and Sidecar (TAS) •Yutaka Ozaki: Wine Distributor, Wine Diamonds (Japan) •Matt Wallace: Wine Direct (SA)


The Adelaide Review June 2014 45

adelaidereview.com.au

HOT100

Same, Same but Different

Hot 100 Wines

THE ADELAIDE REVIEW

SOUTH AUSTRALIAN

“Singapore Airlines is excited to celebrate the best of our iconic South Australian wine industry in conjunction with the Hot 100 SA Wines for the seventh consecutive year. We are proud to have been serving South Australia for 30 years as the World’s Most Awarded Airline.” Hugh Chevron-Breton, Singapore Airlines

The Hot 100 SA Wines is back for another year. It will be the same but different.

by Trevor Maskell, Chief Steward

B

anjo Harris Plane joins us as the new Chief Judge; some new faces arrive to judge on the panel and there will be new stewards doing their thing behind the scenes. That means new energy, new focus, and new outcomes. And of course, a new winner. Each year, The Adelaide Review Hot 100 SA Wines is held in the Regency International Centre at the Regency Park campus of TAFE SA, and allows students from Le Cordon Bleu, TAFE SA and ICHM to work side-by-side, giving wine savvy and passionate students an opportunity to work in the presence of some of the wine industry’s leaders, dreamers and believers. This is volunteering in-between their classes and studies. What the students learn over two weeks of sorting, stewarding, tasting and judging, is the convergence: we have moved on from grape variety. We have chosen to ignore the ‘natural wine’ element. A wine show like ours opens the doors and invites all winemakers here in our wonderful state to enter their products. All wines produced here are a reflection of our state, our land and our place. Our home. For local and international students to realise the importance

of all of these traits and to be able to see and join the industry in action atour facilities is priceless. Another important lesson for the stewards to realise is that the Hot 100 is not a hippie commune wine show, or a ‘natural wine’ fest, or any of the other references to it made by some within the industry. It is a gathering of big name wines and small winemakers to bring their wares together as a collective voice of South Australian wine. The students see that there is a place for both big and small names, and the winemaker chooses where they would like their wines judged in the various drinking styles and categories the Hot 100 uniquely offers. The stewards learn that there is no agenda or bias. Every wine has a chance. And every steward learns taste, place, style, and flavour of each of those wines. That’s education of the palate, mind and heart. As it should be.

“TAFE SA is proud to partner with The Adelaide Review and the Hot 100 SA Wines. TAFE SA’s Regency Campus is synonymous with quality food and wine education in South Australia and partnering with Australia’s premier innovative wine show is a perfect match. It is a fantastic opportunity to showcase Regency’s staff and facilities.” Tony Adey, Educational Manager, TAFE SA

“Le Cordon Bleu is proud of our partnership with The Adelaide Review and the Hot 100 SA Wines event. Over many years teaching our students the skills and knowledge needed to excel in their field, we are pleased to inspire our students with examples of what can be achieved through hard work, determination and skill. It is also important to us to partner with an event of this calibre that recognises the important connection between food and wine, because what better field is there than that of the simple pleasures in life - good food, good wine and great friends to share it with. We wish every participant success, and look forward to tasting South Australia’s best wines.” Derrick Casey, COO, Le Cordon Bleu

Welcome back and good luck.

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“Fox Tucker Lawyers represent a wide range of local, national and international organisations, and have a strong, established presence in the South Australian wine industry. Our specialist practitioners can provide legal expertise in the areas of Taxation, Insurance & Risk Management, Corporate & Commercial, Employment, Property and Commercial Dispute Resolution, and understand the industry’s delicate balance between creative passion and commercial focus. We’re absolutely thrilled to again be partnering with Hot 100 SA Wines.” Janet Miller, CEO, Fox Tucker Lawyers

per night

Tony Adey, Roger Haden and Banjo Harris Plane.

HOT 100 SPONSOR EVENT The Adelaide Review officially launched the Hot 100 season on Wednesday, April 9 at the Apothecary.

Vanessa Altman and Scott Williams.

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Emma Aiston and Spohie Guiney.

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46 The Adelaide Review June 2014

WINTER DINING Maxwell’s Ellen Street Restaurant Following a stint at Nigel Rich’s The Elbow Room, former Eden Dining Room & Bar Head Chef Tom Boden is now in charge of Maxwell Wines’ Ellen Street Restaurant with his wife Kate. Using local produce, including delicious mushrooms grown onsite in Maxwell’s famous limestone cave, the ideal way to experience Boden’s winter menu is his six-course degustation, which at $70 ($95 with matching Maxwell wines) is a steal. Starting with the refreshing shiitake broth with

Oxenberry Farm Cellar Door & Cafe Since opening in 2011, Oxenberry Farm Cafe has left an imprint on McLaren Vale locals and visitors alike with its beautiful old school countrystyle cafe vibe. Complemented by Oxenberry Farm wines available at the adjoining cellar door (which opened in 2009), Oxenberry Farm is a true country cafe with its menu and charm. Some of the choice items to select at this historic site – Devonshire farmers William Colton and Charles Hewett set up their homes on the green

The Hotel Metropolitan Listed on the South Australian State Heritage Register, this iconic pub endured a makeover of note some a few years back when the current owners took it over to revitalise the Grote St hotel. Known for its live music (five nights a week) and as a place to stop before and after a show at Her Majesty’s Theatre, The Metro is also known for its quality pub food. A seasonal menu which utilises the produce from the Adelaide Central Market across the road, highlights of the winter menu include

The Anchorage The historic seafront Victor Harbor hotel offers stunning views of Encounter Bay and its menu is just as spectacular – perfect for an outing down at Victor. Striking winter warmers available from the Anchorage cafe, restaurant and wine bar include its 12-hour slow-roasted lamb shoulder or the Estrella-battered Pt Lincoln mulloway with fries, aioli and Fattoush, but the item to select is its seafood bouillabaisse with Australian prawns, calamari, fresh fish and mussels in a tomato, fennel and saffron broth.

celeriac foam, you move onto some of Chef’s delights including the chargrilled ox tongue with kohlrabi remoulade, and rib eye of veal with wild mushroom ragu. While dining at Ellen Street you’ll get to experience stunning views of Maxwell Wines’ vineyards – this is rural winter dining at its finest.

The Balti House

Maxwell’s Ellen Street Restaurant

Maxwell’s Ellen Street Restaurant Corner of Olivers and Chalk Hill Roads McLaren Vale Lunch: Friday to Monday from 12pm, dinner: Fridays from 6pm 8323 8200 maxwellwines.com.au

Lenzerheide Restaurant

lush valley here in 1840 – is its farmers’ platter which includes locally sourced produce. The Oxenburger is also a must-try with its buns from Home Grain Bakery, McLaren Vale premium mince. Also recommended are Oxenberry’s gourmet home-style pies.

Oxenberry Farm Cellar Door & Cafe 24-26 Kangarilla Road McLaren Vale 10am to 5pm, seven days a week, 8323 0188 oxenberry.com

chilli- and fennel-rubbed pork fillet, Peking duck pancakes, grilled haloumi and quinoa salad and the Metro’s chilli and garlic BBQ squid. You can’t top The Metro for the complete pub experience.

The Hotel Metropolitan 46 Grote Street Open seven days a week Lunch: 12pm to 2.30pm Dinner: 6pm to 8.30pm 8231 5471 hotelmetro.com.au

With an international wine bar featuring 80 specialty beers and wines from surrounding wineries, The Anchorage is the perfect place to anchor down south for lunch or dinner.

The Anchorage 21 Flinders Parade, Victor Harbor Open seven days a week Breakfast: 8am to 11am, lunch: 12pm to 2.30pm, dinner: Sunday to Thursday – 5.30 to 8.30pm, Friday and Saturday – 5.30pm to 9pm 8552 5970 anchorageseafronthotel.com

Winter Dining Long, chilly winter nights call for cosy corners and those special food treats that make us feel warm inside and out, as this winter dining feature showcases.

The Anchorage

The Hotel Metropolitan


The Adelaide Review June 2014 47

adelaidereview.com.au

ADVERTISING FEATURE

The King’s Head

The Balti House The Balti House was a well-kept secret that thankfully is starting to get some notice with its delicious British-influenced Bangladeshi cuisine. It’s inconspicuous Goodwood Road locale doesn’t pay justice to the sub-continent delights inside. When at The Balti House, you must try its delicious mince samosas as well as its balti chicken (a dish cooked in a cast iron wok with fresh blended spices, fresh vegetables and flavoured with herbs). Also,

The King’s HEad The King’s Head, formerly known as The Kings, is famous for its South Australian-only mantra, meaning all the produce and booze is from SA. Fantastic. Its winter menu includes its famous gourmet pie floater. This beauty of a beef brisket, Shiraz and mushroom pie floats in green pea soup with a dollop of Beerenberg chutney to round things off nicely. If you’re

taste the king prawn biryani and wash this delight down with a cold beer or two. The ideal way to finish off a Balti House feast is its galub jamuns – delicious traditional Indian sweets that are worth the trip to Balti House alone.

The Balti House 2/167 Goodwood Road, Millswood Open seven days a week, 5pm until late 8357 7716 baltihouse.com.au

not in a pie mood, then the dukkah-crusted Savannah lamb rack with smoked pomme puree, garlic-wilted red kale, basil-roasted cherry tomato, saffron aioli, lemon and pomegranate is also perfect for this winter.

The King’s Head 357 King William Street Open seven days a week 8212 6657 thekingsbardining.com

Jack Ruby

Lenzerheide RESTAURANT The elegant Hawthorn institution celebrates its 25th anniversary this year, continuing to offer the best of European-style dining in this multi Restaurant and Catering Award winner. With classic Lenzerheide dishes such as its potato, bacon and leak soup, which has featured on the menu since the day it opened, and Onkaparinga Valley venison, Lenzerheide’s current winter dish to relish is its trio of beef delights – gulf prawn, sauce of rosemary, honey and soy; bordelaise and hollandaise sauce,

Jack Ruby

Oxenberry Farm Cellar Door & Cafe

Named after Jack Ruby – American, nightclub owner and Lee Harvey Oswald assassin – this basement bar and diner is a speakeasy-style soul bar with more than just soul food. Getting prepared for winter with a slow cooked menu, Jack Ruby and its Head Chef impress with a gang of inspired delights including its mind-blowing house-smoked beef cheek with bacon and beetroot and bone marrow puree, fried barramundi Baja taco

cherry truss tomato and asparagus; and rich cream, brandy, green peppercorns, demiglaze – a perfect way to sample your steak three ways. You can enjoy your choice with a glass or bottle from Lenzerheide’s extensive and impressive wine list.

Lenzerheide Restaurant 146 Belair Road, Hawthorn Lunch: Tuesday to Saturday from 12pm, dinner: Tuesday to Saturday from 6pm, High Tea: Tuesday to Saturday 12pm to 3pm 8373 3711 lenzerheide.com.au

with avocado, radish and coriander and its Wagyu beef burger. But if you really want to experience what Jack Ruby’s has to offer, try the Yoder Meat Fest (12-hour brisket, pulled pork, ribs, buffalo wings, chillislaw, corn on the cob and soft tacos) – brilliant.

Jack Ruby Basement, 89 King William Street Monday to Saturday, 11.30am until late 8231 5795 jackruby.com.au


48 The Adelaide Review June 2014

FOOD.WINE.COFFEE

Cheese Matters

Fondue Ingredients • 450g gruyère cheese, grated • 450g comte cheese, grated • 15g cornflour • 30ml sherry • 2 thyme sprigs • 3 garlic cloves, bashed • 500ml white wine • 1 tbsp lemon juice • 5g English mustard powder • 1 pinch ground nutmeg

Fondue BY Kris Lloyd

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epending on your era you may or may not be familiar with fondue. This sharing experience of food was totally hip and groovy in the 70s,when fondue parties were the dinner party of choice. It seems the roots of fondue lie in Switzerland, where it was promoted with slogans such as “fondue is good and creates a good mood”. Over time many countries around the world adopted fondue.

Method 1. Start by mixing the grated cheeses with the cornflour in a bowl, then bring the sherry to a simmer in a small saucepan over medium heat. Add the thyme and garlic then remove from the heat and allow it to infuse for a few minutes. Strain and allow to cool. Bring the wine and lemon juice to the boil in a medium saucepan, then add the cheese, a little at a time, stirring continuously until it is glossy, smooth and creamy. 2. Now add the infused sherry, mustard powder and ground nutmeg. Stir those into the cheese and wine and continue to stir until the fondue thickens. 3. Transfer this to your fondue pot and serve with cubes of sourdough bread and crudités. I love cornichons, olives, radishes, asparagus, cherry tomatoes and mushrooms as seasonal dippings. 4. It is important to make sure the cheese fondue mixture is kept warm enough to maintain a smooth and liquid mixture, but not so hot that it burns. For something a bit different, replace the wine with beer or cider, the flavours are great.

Special little pots were required, with distinctive forks that have long stems, lots of melting style cheese and yummy food bits to put on the end of your fork to dip into the hot cheesey liquid. The fondue pot is quite a cute little thing that generally sits on a stand and has a little burner underneath in order to keep the fondue warm and in a liquid state. The fondue pot became a very popular wedding gift in the 70s. I recall many people telling me when I was looking for fondue pots for CheeseFest last year, they still had the one they were given for a wedding gift in the shed or on the top shelf in the pantry room. Well, if you have one bring it out! Fondue has once again become a popular gastronomic experience, one we should all try at least once. The cooler weather now is begging for a fondue session to happen. So here’s how you go about it. Of course if you do not have a fondue pot, visit your local op shop, they are sure to have a couple stashed on their shelves. Now, the important bit – the cheese. You must choose the correct cheese in order to produce a really good fondue. Select from quality Gruyere, Edam, Emmentaler, sharp Cheddar or even Camembert. There are many recipes for fondue. Once you start looking it is quite surprising. Even

“There is a natural affinity between cheese and wine.”

celebrity chefs have a few takes on this groovy offering. The first recorded fondue recipe was in a 1699 book which was published in Zurich under the name Käss mit Wein zu kochen which translates to ‘cooking with cheese and wine’. It simply asks for one cup of grated or cut cheese to be melted with wine and to dip bread cubes into it. While the foundation is there, a few more ingredients really go a long way in shaping some great flavours for you to enjoy. Fondue should be runny and stringy, not thick and stodgy, and the key to achieving this is using cornflour and white wine. The cornflour

prevents the proteins in the cheese coagulating and the acidity in the wine keeps the cheese stringy. Here’s my favourite recipe, which I discovered when looking for fondue recipes for the Funky Fondue Lounge at CheeseFest last year.

»»Kris Lloyd is Woodside Cheese Wrights’ Head Cheesemaker

Another type of very popular fondue is the chocolate fondue. Personally I am not a sweet tooth, so I will stick to the cheese version but I am acutely aware I could be in the minority there. Try melted Toblerone in some good dark chocolate with a titch of your favourite liqueur, something like Grand Marnier. Now the dippings for chocolate fondue can be interesting. Anything from marshmallows, chunks of banana, milk bottle lollies, and the perfectly sensible strawberry all work a treat. I can hear you now: “Have you seen the old fondue set?” I hope I have encouraged you to dust it off and enjoy the “good mood” that fondue creates.

woodsidecheese.com.au

EXPERIENCE A 2014 SMELLY CHEESE SHOP CHEESE MASTER CLASS WINTER CHEESE CLASS $80 inc GST ($73 for members) Venue - 25 Wright St, Adelaide

FRENCH CHEESE AND WINE $80 inc GST ($73 for members) Venue - 25 Wright St, Adelaide

AMERICAN CHEESE AND WINE $80 inc GST ($73 for members) Venue - 25 Wright St, Adelaide

As the temperature drops and winter approaches, thoughts naturally turn to comfort foods. It is the perfect time for a cheese fondue or raclette, or an oven baked Petit Sapin. In this warming winter class you will also discover the mysterious Appenzeller from Switzerland and learn about the return to traditional Gruyere cheese making techniques in the village of Etivaz. Join us for a one and only night with our skilled chefs and amazing cheese expert. A warming glass of Shiraz or cup of tea will complement this interactive evening.

Cheese has always been a staple of French cuisine and what is good food without good wine. French cheese and wine reflect their regional surrounds or ‘terroirs’ and are intertwined with local history and traditions. So if you are a ‘fin gourmet’, or simply crazy about cheese, take this opportunity to learn about the famous cheese producing regions, Normandie, Vallée de la Loire, Auvergne, Ile de France and Bourgogne and the wines that best complement their cheese. It will also give you a chance to brush up on some difficult French pronunciation!

The American Dairy Industry is young and growing rapidly, with an exciting and varied selection available. Their large population and the good climate for dairy farming are conducive to this growth in both volume and variety. You will have the opportunity to taste magnificent cow, goat and mixed milk cheese from Wisconsin, Vermont and Northern California. Come and explore with us the extraordinary variety of textures and flavours accompanied by some exceptional wines from the Napa Valley.

CLASS DATES Wednesday 18th June 6.30pm-8.30pm

CLASS DATES Monday 14th July 6.30pm-8.30pm

CLASS DATES Tuesday 29th July 6.30pm - 8.30pm

smellycheese.com.au

TheSmellyCheeseShop

@SmellyCheese44

PHONE: 8231 5867 TO BOOK

or visit smellycheeseclub.com.au (all classes held at 25 Wright Street, Adelaide) Fun for friends, perfect for corporates and great as gifts!


THE ADELAIDE R EVIEW JUNE 2014

FORM D E S I G N • P L A N N I N G • I N N OVAT I O N

Dimitty Andersen Architects / Toorak Gardens Residence Photo: SamNoonan.

2014 SOUTH AUSTRALIAN ARCHITECTURE AWARDS


50 The Adelaide Review June 2014

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2014 South Australian Architecture Awards

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eld annually since 1981, the South Australian Architect Awards recognise the state’s finest projects, designs and structures in both residential and commercial environments. This year’s awards will be held on Friday, July 4 at the Entertainment Centre. The Adelaide Review

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has partnered with the Australian Institute of Architects for the last six years to present the People’s Choice Award. This year, the People’s Choice Award covers both residential categories (Houses and Alterations & Additions). Voting for this award opens on Monday, June 3 at midday and closes on Friday, June 20 at 5pm.

1.Max Pritchard Architect / StirlingHouse / Photo: Sam Noonan 2.Architects Ink / Residence R / Photo: Sam Noonan 3.Troppo / Roodenrys Kewell Addition / Photo: Troppo 4.Max Pritchard Architect / Surf House / Photo: Sam Noonan 5.Troppo / Jureidini Living Wing / bong Houses / Photo: Julian Rutt 8.Max Pritchard Architect / Prestipino House / Photo: Sam Noonan 9.Max Pritchard Architect / Second Valley House / Photo: Sam Noonan 10.Grieve Gillett Pty Ltd / Goolwa Beach House / Photo: Peter Barnes 11.Max Pritchard Architect /


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ADELAIDEREVIEW.COM.AU

THE ADELAIDE REVIEW JUNE 2014 51

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TO VOTE Go to adelaidereview.com.au to vote for your favourite entry from the residential categories. By voting you are in the running to win a The Forum chair by Hussl, Austria in fuchsia pink or natural, courtesy of 1K Chairs. Valued at RRP$690

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Photo: Jamie Gill 6.Dimitty Andersen Architects / Toorak Gardens Residence / Photo: Sam Noonan 7.Julian Rutt Lumen Studio / BillaDune House / Photo: Sam Noonan 12.Hames Sharley / Karidis Residence / Photo: Peter Barnes.

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52 The Adelaide Review June 2014

FORM

Smart by Design

existing Wardle-designed buildings. But what sets the Jeffrey Smart Learning Centre apart is the substantial external recreational space it offers. “We conceived the ground floor as having the interior continuous with the exterior, so the interior spaces make sense when you understand them in the context of the courtyard,” explains Dwyer. “We see it as being an active and fluid ground plane that provides a range of settings students can enjoy.”

With the opening of the new Jeffrey Smart Learning Centre, the University of South Australia offers its students and staff a worldclass facility.

This variation is also continued throughout the building’s other seven levels with flexible learning spaces a defining design concept. Seating is a mix of in-built furniture as well as loose tables and chairs that can be re-configured to suit small or large study groups. The combination of different furniture types makes the interior spaces feel ‘crafted’ somehow and lends each individual alcove or hub unique definition. Giving students a choice in how they wish to occupy the building is a generosity on the part of the architects, making for a heightened user experience.

by Leanne Amodeo

I

t was starting to feel like construction on the University of South Australia’s Jeffrey Smart Learning Centre was never going to finish. But after two years the much-anticipated addition to the City West campus finally opened its doors on April 28 to some fanfare. Designed by John Wardle Architects, who partnered with Phillips Pilkington Architects and also worked closely with Wilson Architects on the learning spaces, the eight-level 13,400sqm building is an imposing new structure situated in the far west end of Hindley Street. The Centre has already garnered the reputation for being a ‘one stop shop’ amongst students, as it not only houses the University’s library and a number of flexible learning spaces, it also accommodates student services, including Campus Central and Security and Campus Operations. For John Wardle Architects’ Senior Associate Meaghan Dwyer it represents a new approach to a university building. “Because we were providing a much more comprehensive service for students, there

was a lot of time spent understanding the detail that needed to be included in order to make the building a success,” she says. “Rather than just designing it as a straight library, which is the more conventional approach.”

The new building’s function is as compelling as its form. The boldly angular, predominantly off-white precast concrete façade is in keeping with John Wardle Architects’ signature style, which is also evident across the University’s

Colour also plays a key role in engaging students and the interior palette is striking for its boldness and variation. Dwyer is aware the building’s large scale disallowed the use of a single colour across all levels, as this would have simply appeared monotonous. The solution was to apply a different colour palette for each floor and these were selected from distinct South Australian landscapes. Not only does this work as a wayfinding strategy, but it also adds warmth. As Dwyer reflects: “We really conceived this building as being the heart of the campus in many ways; it’s a building that’s relevant to all the students and we dearly hope it’s a place they enjoy.”

johnwardlearchitects.com unisa.edu.au

Capture our City’s architectural icons in Real Life Instagram Take a self-guided walk to over 20 award-winning architectural icons in the City of Adelaide. Find the locations of the #ADLarchigram frames, take a photo of your unique view and share on social media using the following hashtags #ADLarchigram #saaawards2014 #architecture #adelaide #southaustralia For more information, search #ADLarchigram AN INITIATIVE BY SUPPORTED BY or visit voice.architecture.com.au South Australian Health and Medical Research Institute by Woods Bagot Image Credit: Peter Clarke


THE ADELAIDE REVIEW JUNE 2014 53

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Game Plan Designing the furniture for the main areas of the Southern and Eastern Stands in the Adelaide Oval redevelopment has been a professional and personal highlight for designer Franco Crea.

BY LEANNE AMODEO

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ranco Crea has been making waves since being shortlisted for the Launchpad emerging designer competition last year. He may not have won, but it didn’t stop people within the design industry and beyond from taking notice. The exciting Adelaide-based furniture designer has been busy with seemingly back-to-back public and private commissions and the Franco Crea brand is now stocked in Schiavello. However, his most ambitious contract to date is the redevelopment of Adelaide Oval by Cox Architecture in association with Hames Sharley and Walter Brooke. Crea’s involvement in the project began when Estilo Commerical and Cox Architecture approached him looking for a local furniture design solution for the Southern and Eastern Stands. He then worked closely with the Adelaide-based supplier and Cox Architecture’s interior designer Zoe King to design different tables for the Corporate Suites, Members Bar, Sports Bar, Lawn Bar and BBQ terrace. Crea also designed a series of ottomans and stools for the Members Bar, bringing the total number of pieces in his collection to nine.

Selecting the finishes was of the utmost importance as Crea wanted to pay respect

to the site’s heritage and reputation. “I’ve always thought Adelaide Oval had a sense of elegance to its history and I wanted to reflect that in my furniture,” he says. Along with Estilo Commerical and King the decision was made to use materials such as solid oak and brass, which would give a sophisticated and distinguished appearance. Crea’s fine attention to detail characterises the designer’s wider portfolio and is also particularly evident in the Members Bar’s Mila bar table’s brass foot rail and handturned stools made to resemble cricket bails. Custom designing each piece was not without its problems, however, and Crea cites the Mena table and bar table as endearingly troublesome. “Folding and bending those pieces of round steel to create the legs and achieve a high-end technological result was such a challenge,” he reflects. “But I’m very proud of the method and that’s the reason I wanted to keep the tops so simple, so as not to take the focus away from the base.” The Mena series is a fitting addition to the Oval’s Corporate Suites and is very much in keeping with Crea’s theme of elegance and sophistication.

As part of the Stage Two redevelopment the five areas in the Southern and Eastern Stands have been serving members and the public well since the commencement of the 2014 AFL season. It’s a credit to the architects and Estilo Commercial that they engaged a local emerging furniture designer rather than choose a big international name. It must have been a daunting task, but Crea exceeded all

expectations. His understanding of beautiful form and practical function, along with careful consideration of spatiality is ultimately what makes his collection for the Adelaide Oval an overwhelming success.

adelaideoval.com.au francocrea.com.au

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54 THE ADELAIDE REVIEW JUNE 2014

FORM

Gold Class Skycity Adelaide Casino is currently undergoing a major redevelopment and the design outcome is nothing short of spectacular. contractors had to work with. The Platinum Gaming Room’s construction was completed in eight weeks, but even more unbelievable is the Baccarat Pavilion’s seven-week construction period. The latter’s 495sqm floor space may make it the smaller of the two spaces, but the quality of the fit out is just as impressive. With a theme inspired by China and South East Asia, the pavilion’s striking red, black, grey and white colour palette is repeated to great effect throughout the heavily patterned carpet and oversized light fittings.

BY LEANNE AMODEO

T

he recent refurbishment of Melbourne’s Crown Casino has set a new standard in hospitality and leisure offerings of this type. No wonder that other casinos around the country have felt the impetus to follow suit. Skycity Adelaide’s interior may have served the grand establishment well since opening 29 years ago, but the time has come for a facelift. This refresh takes the form of a $45 million redevelopment that boasts the recently renovated Platinum Gaming Room and Baccarat Pavilion as part of first phase renovations.

Both areas re-opened earlier this year and impressed with their lavishly decadent, yet elegant, aesthetic. The emphasis throughout is on rich colour, fine joinery and bespoke details, highlighting a strong commitment to artisanal values and craftsmanship. Skycity was smart to call in the architects responsible for the Crown Casino refurbishment, Bates Smart, to design its first floor premium gaming room and longstanding partner The Buchan Group to design the ground floor pavilion. Schiavello was also engaged as the project’s contractors to translate the design vision. As Aaron Morrison, Skycity’s Group General Manager of Business Development,

drink dine design

emerging designer award 2014

explains: “We wanted to create something that exceeded anything else that was in the South Australian marketplace, and we also wanted to do something that was in keeping with the heritage characteristics of the building.” The relatively straightforward brief gave both Bates Smart and The Buchan Group enough scope to conceptualise spaces that would not only make regular customers feel welcome, but would also make interstate and international visitors want to keep coming back. The 780sqm Platinum Gaming Room, in particular, pays tribute to the building’s 1920s heritage with an Art Deco-inspired design that borrows much from the spirit of The Great

Gatsby. The detailing is exquisite and features bevelled-edge glass mirrors, extruded and anodised aluminium fluting and solid marble. The room’s most resounding design feature, however, is the chandelier ring pendants that hang from the low ceiling. They feature over 1000 Swarovski crystals, which were imported from Austria and installed by hand. “It was technically difficult for us because they’re custom lights and we were doing research and development while we were building, so they’re basically a working prototype,” says Schiavello’s Design Manager Sascha Frost.

The Baccarat Room also highlights one of the key challenges that comes with configuring any casino interior. “There’s a lot of coordination involved in terms of services and furniture placement,” explains Frost. “We had to try to minimise how the surveillance appears, so that the cameras aren’t in customers’ faces but are all over the tables.” As phase two begins with the addition of a new VIP gaming lounge to the Platinum Gaming Room and the refurbishment of the Barossa Room and restaurant, Schiavello are once again on-board as project contractors. Should the current renovations be anything to go by, the buzz surrounding this redevelopment doesn’t look like subsiding anytime soon.

This seems like a minor obstacle, however, when compared to the tight timeframe the

schiavello.com

ENTRIES OPEN Focusing on South Australia’s reputation for great food, wine and dining experiences, the award calls for innovative and exciting product design ideas to enhance the experience of consuming food and wine. The $3,000 award is open to emerging designers anywhere in the world who have completed a design training or study program in South Australia in the last five years or who are currently completing one.

ENTRIES CLOSE 1 SEPTEMBER 2014 FOR ENTRY FORM AND MORE INFO VISIT WWW.JAMFACTORY.COM.AU Hot 100 Wines

THE ADELAIDE REVIEW

SOUTH AUSTRALIAN

Liam Mugavin, Tangle Coffee Table, 2013



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