ENTERTAINMENT
CULTURE CONTINUED
PICTURES OF THE SEA ARCADIA: IN THE LATE 1960S THERE WAS A DEFINITE MOVEMENT BY SURFERS TO LEAVE THE CITIES AND TO GO TO LIVE IN THE COASTAL TOWNS NEAR THE BEST SURFING BREAKS IN AUSTRALIA. THIS HAPPENED RIGHT ACROSS THE COUNTRY, BUT NOWHERE WAS IT SO PRONOUNCED AS ON THE NORTH COAST OF NEW SOUTH WALES, WITH THE BYRON BAY AREA A SINGULAR MAGNET. THIS PICTURE SHOWS WAYNE LYNCH AND BOB MCTAVISH IN THE BEAUTIFUL COUNTRY AROUND POSSUM CREEK. IT WAS TAKEN IN 1969 AND FEATURED IN THE ‘COUNTRY SOUL’ ISSUE OF SURF INTERNATIONAL MAGAZINE.
Arcadia is an exhibition of lyrical, richly textured photographs by John Witzig, cofounder of Tracks magazine and founder of SeaNotes, with huge ink drawings by Nicholas Harding and psychedelic film footage by Albe Falzon. It expresses the free-spirited, revolutionary character of a group of young and perfectly formed Australian surfers in the early 1970s. Photographer John Witzig answered a few questions about this exhibition curated by Sarah Engledow.
What was it about the era that is so evocative? Your photos make me think of a time when we didn’t look at our phones, where a single day could stretch almost a week… Yeah, no phones, that’s for sure. I was working for several surfing magazines through a 15year period from 1966, so there were deadlines of course (and we were actually reasonably professional), but somehow it was remarkably more relaxed… but evocative? I’m not sure.
ANNUAL FUNDRAISER
Surfing almost seems to be a different sport these days – your photos remind us of a time when it was intrinsically linked to
What are the highlights of the exhibition? Who are the surfing legends featured here?
counterculture; now it seems more about the dollar… is that something you have noticed? ‘Modern’ surfing had really only arrived in Australia in the very late 1950s, so by the early 70s it was still an adolescent. The link with counterculture is real, but the Aquarius Festival wasn’t until 1973. Surfers had been obsessive about the northern NSW coast for more than a decade before that. And yes, a different sport now… a different world. Change happens. You have some amazing shots of Wayne Lynch and Bob McTavish at Possum Creek. Can you tell me about when those were taken? The picture of Wayne Lynch and Bob McTavish that I call Arcadia was taken in 1969 at Possum Creek. I was working for a magazine called Surf International and was planning a ‘Country Soul’ issue. That sentiment reflected my own feelings about how and where I wanted to live, and what I observed in many of the people I hung around with.
In a funny way I don’t think that there are highlights. Well, there’s the ‘hero’ shot of course, and quite a number of other pictures that’ve been blown up to two metres wide or high. That’s pretty amazing. Why black and white? All the photographic heroes from my late teenage years shot in black and white. I was taking more colour in the later 1960s because Surf International ran a lot of it, but my main love has always been black and white. In 1970 David Elfick, Albe Falzon and I started Tracks and it was only black and white for the first couple of years. I also liked being able to process the film and do the prints myself. Tweed Regional Gallery and Margaret Olley Art Centre Murwillumbah; open Wednesday to Sunday 10am–5pm,(DST) as daylight saving time will come into effect from Sunday 4 October. Opening Friday 5.15pm for an exhibition preview floor talk by Dr Sarah Engledow, music by Windy Hill and opened officially at 6.30pm by Robert Drewe.
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28 September 30, 2015 The Byron Shire Echo
SICARIO
Whether or not the end justifies the means has always been a foggy issue. Especially when the means involve activities that cross the line of what is strictly legal, or worse, what is unconscionably cruel. And to what extent can Draconian law enforcement be seen to ratchet up the bad guys’ reprisals? The viciousness of those who control the illicit drug trade between Mexico and the US is incomprehensible to us in our cloistered corner of the world. That successfully dealing with the cartels might necessitate the abandonment of morality and decency would offend our bourgeois sensibilities – but things are different in the real world. As an outsider who does things by the book, Officer Macer (Emily Blunt) is seconded to a covert operations crew and is immediately outraged by the methods employed by her new associates, Graver (Josh Brolin) and the shady Alejandro (Benicio Del Toro). But she is unable, or unwilling, to do anything about it. She is a strange character – entirely passive and ineffective, like a fly on the wall. This is a confronting movie insofar as it demands that you make a judgment that you would rather not have to think about. The glossy veneer of our civilisation blinds us to the uncompromising and often murderous mechanics that underpin it – we’d rather not be bothered by it while we’re watching The Block with our takeaway Thai. The unholy thrill that Kathryn Bigelow presented us with in Zero Dark Thirty is similarly at play here as Alejandro, whose motivation is all too easy to condone, relentlessly tracks down a cartel ‘jefe’ (boss). You want him to succeed because you’re only human and the need for vengeance is one of the deepest, most transferable of our instincts. If there are dirty deeds being done on our behalf – as there surely are – should we express high-minded outrage? Or turn a blind eye? Denis Villeneuve’s intense, fatalistic film might occasionally exhibit an overwillingness to show blood-splattered walls and carcasses, but, as Graver tells Macer, with cold certainty, ‘this is the future’.
ODDBALL
The power of imagination and our eagerness to be transported by it is a wonderful thing, is it not? At one point in this cracking movie, the dog Oddball has gone missing and his distraught owner, Swampy (Shane Jacobson), is seen wandering the cliffs near Warrnambool, calling his name. The mood is fraught, the packed cinema holding its breath, hoping that that no harm has come to the loveable white mutt. Then, from near the front row, a plaintive little voice cries ‘Oddball!’ This is the true story of how a colony of fairy penguins living on a small island off the coast of Victoria was saved from the predation of foxes by a lumbering long-haired Maremma sheepdog. Of course, there needs to be more to it than that to make a story out of it and Peter Ivan’s script weaves romance, comedy and mystery (I didn’t guess the ‘reveal’) through the narrative in equal measure. Jacobson, as in Kenny, exudes warmth and genuineness – he is possibly the only actor in Oz who could get away with ‘whacko-thediddlo’ (a blast from the past). As a result, you can’t help but care about him, his single-mum daughter Emily (Sarah Snook) and doting granddaughter Olivia (Coco Jack Gillies). The necessary conflict is with those who scheme to have the island’s status as a sanctuary abandoned in favour of turning it into a whaleviewing site. Director Stuart McDonald never wallows in the bathos that marred Red Dog and, as well as capturing some beautiful shots of the rugged coastline, cinematographer Damian Wyvill displays a painterly eye with the green-screen, managing to evoke in the island scenes an old-fashioned secretive atmosphere reminiscent of the Famous Five – and there is also a hint of Gerald Durrell in the cosiness of the tale-telling. Naysayers and connoisseurs will scoff that the Disney-type depiction of animals is juvenile bunk, but surely anything at all that opens young minds to the plight of the world’s vanishing wildlife is to be applauded. I loved it.
Byron Shire Echo archives: www.echo.net.au/byron-echo