It’s that time of year again in Sydney. The jacarandas are in bloom, the first cicadas are shockingly loud, the weather lurches from chilly to sweltering from one day to the next, and the cliffs between Bondi to Tamarama have become a sculpture gallery. Richard Tulloch has already reported, with fabulous photos, on this year’s Sculpture by the Sea, but that’s no reason for me not to tell you, again, what I saw there, and post an album of phone photos (yes, we forgot to take a camera).
We went this afternoon to avoid the weekend crush. It was far from crowded – the joggers were hardly inconvenienced at all.
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- Paul Trefry’s ‘Little boy lost’: the controversial late-addition bathers no longer in evidence, I’m pleased to note. People were queuing to have their photos taken with him
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- Kevin Draper’s ‘Fragment’
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- Mitsuo Takeuchi’s ‘Transfiguration “screw” IX’
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- Part of BAM’s ‘Step by step, inch by inch … towards the precipice’, many shoes that seemed to be made of sand, marching towards the cliff edge
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- Ian Scott’s ‘Waiting’ – they’re about as tall as your forearm
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- Not sculptures, not looking at sculptures
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- Bjorn Godwin’s ‘Sunken cathedral’, one of many pieces with an ecological theme, this one genuinely poignant
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- Morgan Shimeld’s ‘Traced tower’
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- The homeless man who has pitched his tent on the cliff below the path entered into the spirit of the event. He also put out a bowl for donations. This was the only cost if you didn’t buy the $10 catalogue
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- Philippe Moreau’s ‘A man above’
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- Part of Jenny Orchard’s ‘Plant people’, my vote for the best sculpture
As I’m writing the captions for those blurry, poorly composed photos I realise that I could have spent much longer on that walk. For instance, there’s a brightly coloured little house that I’m told has nasty surprises inside, but I couldn’t get anywhere near it because it was full to bursting with children who had been so charmed by the outside that whatever was on the inside made no apparent impression at all. I could have sat with some of the delicately moving pieces for a long time. There were one or two pieces positioned so as to take the walker by surprise. Perhaps I’ll go back to savour them a little.
The sculptures will be there until 15 November.
Me fail? I fly! 
I’m pretty sure the brightly coloured house you mention is by my friend Jane Gillings. Hoping to get to see SbyS soon!
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Nice phone photos, Jonathan. And what did you think of the winning rock? At 91 I suppose the artist deserves a prize for lugging it up the hill into the park, but I didn’t notice any sculpting on it. Or did I miss something?
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Misrule: You’re right. It was a huge hit with the young yesterday.
Richard: Thanks. I liked the winning rock – enough to stroke it surreptitiously, in fact.
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