the ’sham

Back to Sydney: sitting in my studio at Artspace, I recorded this entry today, about a visit to the Marrickville Council Archives to find out some historical stuff about the ’sham.

Re-reading this one year later, I was interested particularly in my reflection on the “embodied knowledge” of Chrys, the council’s local historian who kindly led me through some archival material:

Unlike Chrys, I have no particular feeling for history. Facts and figures, names, places and dates swim in and out of my brain, muddling up with each other and leaving only vague traces and broad sensations. I let her stories wash over me, thankful that she, at least, is an embodied local encyclopedia. No supercomputer fed with all the accumulated data in the archives could transmit such pleasure in the regurgitation, in the transformation of this data into a connected web of stories.

The thing is, I am working towards an exhibition here at Artspace, which will open on the 24th of May. It’s a group show about “Publicity” - referring broadly to the act of making things public - a topic for which my ’sham project is obviously well suited. The thing is - the blog has itself become an archive of stories - a history (?) - and now I am faced with the same problem as Chrys in the council archives: how to bring to life a large body of “data”. It’s all very well to have it all here online, or printed out, but unless it’s activated, brought to life, in some human way, it’s just ore waiting to be mined, right? Of course, you, dear reader/listener, can bring it to life just by reading it or listening to these podcasts…living through it again…But I still can’t help thinking there must be some further way for me to process this stuff…

Listen in here.
Read the original entry here.

Here’s the second installment in the great Petersham podcast project. I have no idea if the quality of the audio is listenable, so please let me know:
April 4th, 2006 [4mb mp3]
…And here is a short audio commentary on what i just read. It’s pretty off the cuff…
April 4th Commentary [4 mins 5mb mp3]

Today (2007) I wandered over to Vanessa’s place to have a cup of tea. On the way I bumped into Glenn, the friendly fellow from the archives. He had a bundle of laminated colour photocopies in his hands and was bustling across Crystal Street to make a presentation to students from Petersham Public School.

Unusually, Vanessa had no cake to offer. In fact, her larder was quite bare, so we decided to head over to south Petersham so I could make us some lunch. On the way back to my place, we bumped into Sarah Sauce, who was riding from her house in Marrickville over to the hospital she works at in Rozelle. We stood on the side of Crystal Street, pretty much in the same place where I’d said hi to Glenn. Sarah said she rides her bike past my house every day, and why did she never see me on my balcony?

At this moment, Anna from the council crossed the street and hollered “Hello Lucas!”

I felt very popular.

(If you want to read the original blog posting in type-written format, it’s here.)

On Thursday morning, I will be leaving Petersham for a few hours. Here’s why…
Chrys gave me the number for Lester, an Aboriginal elder in Marrickville, to follow up some local Indigenous stories. Last week I called him up, and explained my project.

“So, when do you want to come and visit me?” he asked.
“Well, you see…” I began, awkwardly explaining my border restrictions. There was a silence at the end of the line.
“Don’t worry about that, mate!” he said. “Those suburb borders were drawn up by the white invaders. Just come and visit me in Marrickville.”

So there you have it. I guess you could call it “permission”.

(But for the purists out there, don’t worry, I’ll be back in the ’sham by lunchtime.)

Every Tuesday, the Marrickville Council archives, upstairs in the Petersham Town Hall, are open to the public. I arrived just after eleven. A ballroom dancing class was in progress in the Hall itself. Graceful Chinese couples spinning and twirling. It was just as Vanessa had described:

Ballroom dancers seen through doorways. Makes the heart hot air balloon.

I was seized with a sudden craving to join them on the dancefloor. Perhaps I could convince Vanessa to be my dancing pardner next Tuesday morn. Then I could show off some of the scorchin’ moves I learned in highschool…
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