A footnote to my column at @abcnews_au today on Peter Dutton’s Budget reply speech. Link in my bio to the whole thing.
DIVERSITY HIRE ALERT!!! My new column up at @abcnews_au … link in my bio or head straight to the site… I’m writing about Kamala Harris’ new Veep pick Tim Walz and wondering whether there’ll be an outbreak of horror about the fact that his colour and gender likely played a role in him being chosen … 😉😉😉😉😉😉😉 WDYR?
Even when it’s cold and I’m sleep-deprived, walking past this guy every morning improves things by a solid 20 per cent. I impulse bought him rashly (and vomitously) many years ago with pretty much the entire proceeds of a book I wrote that had cost me much effort. Have never regretted it for one second. Very sad that @nicholasharding_artist is no longer with us. What a lovely man he was and just the most beautiful artist. Imagine being able to make water, cliffs and people with a palette knife in this way. ❤️
Team. I know it’s cold. I know ya tired. There’ve been some false starts, yeah. I know it doesn’t feel great. I can’t believe it’s August 1 and this is where we find ourselves. And if I could pull the jumper on for ya and run out there myself, I truly would. But it’s up to you, yeah? And I know if you run out there and give it 110 per cent today … ya gonna be amazing. Okay! Cmooooooonnnnnnnn!!!!
This is my beautiful friend Eran Svigos – artist, raconteur, inventor of the aerosol cocktail, shoe fetishist, jewellery designer and co founder of @palasjewellery… She has been gone longer now, I realised today, than I knew her. But while she lived, she was possibly the MOST alive person I’ve ever known. And she leaves a sparkly trail of jewels and art behind. And her beautiful family (sister Anna, pictured next) and Dad John and Mum Esther, have for the last 16 years passed Eran’s generosity forward by funding a Fringe award in her name for the best solo visual arts show in Fringe. I was so proud to be able to be there today and present it, wearing some old and new Palas fingerbling. And thrilled to open the envelope and find the award went to @samkissajukian – like Eran, a multitalented wonder who makes – apart from comedy about bipolar, which makes me love him even more – giant wonderful paintings that I KNOW Eran would have loved. Everything I see of his I think my own late brother @jamescrabb12 would have loved, too. Heart full. Eran: you are missed and very single day and you would be CARVING UP this @adlfringe ❤️
This is my beautiful friend Eran Svigos – artist, raconteur, inventor of the aerosol cocktail, shoe fetishist, jewellery designer and co founder of @palasjewellery… She has been gone longer now, I realised today, than I knew her. But while she lived, she was possibly the MOST alive person I’ve ever known. And she leaves a sparkly trail of jewels and art behind. And her beautiful family (sister Anna, pictured next) and Dad John and Mum Esther, have for the last 16 years passed Eran’s generosity forward by funding a Fringe award in her name for the best solo visual arts show in Fringe. I was so proud to be able to be there today and present it, wearing some old and new Palas fingerbling. And thrilled to open the envelope and find the award went to @samkissajukian – like Eran, a multitalented wonder who makes – apart from comedy about bipolar, which makes me love him even more – giant wonderful paintings that I KNOW Eran would have loved. Everything I see of his I think my own late brother @jamescrabb12 would have loved, too. Heart full. Eran: you are missed and very single day and you would be CARVING UP this @adlfringe ❤️
This is my beautiful friend Eran Svigos – artist, raconteur, inventor of the aerosol cocktail, shoe fetishist, jewellery designer and co founder of @palasjewellery… She has been gone longer now, I realised today, than I knew her. But while she lived, she was possibly the MOST alive person I’ve ever known. And she leaves a sparkly trail of jewels and art behind. And her beautiful family (sister Anna, pictured next) and Dad John and Mum Esther, have for the last 16 years passed Eran’s generosity forward by funding a Fringe award in her name for the best solo visual arts show in Fringe. I was so proud to be able to be there today and present it, wearing some old and new Palas fingerbling. And thrilled to open the envelope and find the award went to @samkissajukian – like Eran, a multitalented wonder who makes – apart from comedy about bipolar, which makes me love him even more – giant wonderful paintings that I KNOW Eran would have loved. Everything I see of his I think my own late brother @jamescrabb12 would have loved, too. Heart full. Eran: you are missed and very single day and you would be CARVING UP this @adlfringe ❤️
This is my beautiful friend Eran Svigos – artist, raconteur, inventor of the aerosol cocktail, shoe fetishist, jewellery designer and co founder of @palasjewellery… She has been gone longer now, I realised today, than I knew her. But while she lived, she was possibly the MOST alive person I’ve ever known. And she leaves a sparkly trail of jewels and art behind. And her beautiful family (sister Anna, pictured next) and Dad John and Mum Esther, have for the last 16 years passed Eran’s generosity forward by funding a Fringe award in her name for the best solo visual arts show in Fringe. I was so proud to be able to be there today and present it, wearing some old and new Palas fingerbling. And thrilled to open the envelope and find the award went to @samkissajukian – like Eran, a multitalented wonder who makes – apart from comedy about bipolar, which makes me love him even more – giant wonderful paintings that I KNOW Eran would have loved. Everything I see of his I think my own late brother @jamescrabb12 would have loved, too. Heart full. Eran: you are missed and very single day and you would be CARVING UP this @adlfringe ❤️
Just taking a second to reflect on this feat – one person winning the @thestellaprize and @milesfranklinliteraryaward in quick succession, with a book that took ten years to write. Quick and slow. Alexis Wright’s contribution to Australian literature is obviously staggering but the thing that I have always found unique in her writing is the way it trains you as a reader (esp as a non Indigenous reader) to think about time in a different way. When I read her I can feel my brain rustily squealing and protesting and trying to reassert the orthodoxies of time to which I’m accustomed, but after that din dies off you start to get what she’s teaching you which is a kind of deep listening. An incredible and generous thing to be able to do. How lucky we are to have her. And congratulations of course.
Seriously rattled now
Jet lag plus cold equals middle-of-the-night baking inventions. Item: Sour cherry and black pepper focaccia. At 2am, rise from fitful slumber and put three cups cups of plain flour in a large bowl. Drain a large jar of sour cherries (mine was 670g) and reserve the juice. Add half a teaspoon of yeast to the flour and stir through thoroughly. Add two cups of cherry juice and a cup of water or apple juice and stir until a ragged but undeniable dough is formed. Needs to be wet, but not batter. Now stir through a tablespoon of salt and add many many grinds of black pepper and a handful of the drained cherries. Pour 3tbsp of olive oil over the lot and install an airtight cover. Watch Veep till around dawn. By the afternoon, your dough should be bubbly and expanded. Scrape it into a baking tin – I used the standard slice tin – lined with baking paper and drizzled with oil. Let it rise again for another two hours (preheat your oven to FF 190C about halfway through) then dimple with oiled fingers (this just means poking your fingers into the dough to make holes) and poke some cherries into the holes. Drizzle the top with olive oil, another few cracks of pepper, salt flakes, then into the oven for approx 30min. You wind up with a sweet/sour/salty bread that is delicious on its own but would I imagine be terrific for a sandwich with ham@and green olives and provolone. If our rosemary hadn’t succumbed to winter I ABSOLUTELY would have used rosemary.
Had such a good time this morning with a group of early-career content makers from across the ABC … working in everything from audio to research to edit to reporting, everywhere from Tassie to Mackay … they asked such smart questions, it gave me a rush of JOY xx thanks team
Far OUT. Finally got round to seeing Dracula last night … my jaw is on the floor, even though my expectations were very high. A muscular, almost sculptural adaptation of Bram Stoker’s original words by @kip_williams – a work of delight in itself, but then given resonant and incalculably versatile voice by Zahra Newman, playing 23 different roles without a slip, and inhabiting every single one. @marghorwell’s design is perfection. PERFECTION. And the choreography of the camera operators is its own complex miracle to witness. There’s barely another week left but honestly if you can scrounge a ticket let me tell you: worth going by yourself. Worth sitting on a stranger’s lap. Do whatever it takes. Tickets through @sydneytheatreco
Far OUT. Finally got round to seeing Dracula last night … my jaw is on the floor, even though my expectations were very high. A muscular, almost sculptural adaptation of Bram Stoker’s original words by @kip_williams – a work of delight in itself, but then given resonant and incalculably versatile voice by Zahra Newman, playing 23 different roles without a slip, and inhabiting every single one. @marghorwell’s design is perfection. PERFECTION. And the choreography of the camera operators is its own complex miracle to witness. There’s barely another week left but honestly if you can scrounge a ticket let me tell you: worth going by yourself. Worth sitting on a stranger’s lap. Do whatever it takes. Tickets through @sydneytheatreco
Far OUT. Finally got round to seeing Dracula last night … my jaw is on the floor, even though my expectations were very high. A muscular, almost sculptural adaptation of Bram Stoker’s original words by @kip_williams – a work of delight in itself, but then given resonant and incalculably versatile voice by Zahra Newman, playing 23 different roles without a slip, and inhabiting every single one. @marghorwell’s design is perfection. PERFECTION. And the choreography of the camera operators is its own complex miracle to witness. There’s barely another week left but honestly if you can scrounge a ticket let me tell you: worth going by yourself. Worth sitting on a stranger’s lap. Do whatever it takes. Tickets through @sydneytheatreco
Just perfecting my pre show meditation backstage @canberratheatrecentre (usually involves sitting lotus on a sofa) and suddenly the sofa needs to go because @felicityward needs it for her SET for her 8pm show at the same venue! If you’re coming to see me, or even if you’re not, stick around for @felicityward cause I saw her the other day in Adelaide and she is RIDICULOUSLY funny. Also the sofa is KWALITY 😂 @canberracomedy
“That Artificial Intelligence Is Better Than The Real Thing” is the topic of this year’s @sydwritersfest Great Debate, my annual grudge match with David Marr. Rather bold of Marr to agree this year given that he is from the Papyrus Age and still grumbles about programming video recorders. He’s never heard of Instagram either so can someone please print this out and tie it to a pigeon so he gets it? My team @mattieunofficial and Toby Walsh are ready to crush Marr and his quisling defence of the fallible mush that is human intelligence. Marr is fortunate to have @rhysnicholson and @traceyspicer, sure. But a fish rots from the head. We are quietly confident. And bribing @yumichild the host and adjudicator just to make sure.
Come along it’s at the Town Hall 8pm … tickets through @sydwritersfest.
“That Artificial Intelligence Is Better Than The Real Thing” is the topic of this year’s @sydwritersfest Great Debate, my annual grudge match with David Marr. Rather bold of Marr to agree this year given that he is from the Papyrus Age and still grumbles about programming video recorders. He’s never heard of Instagram either so can someone please print this out and tie it to a pigeon so he gets it? My team @mattieunofficial and Toby Walsh are ready to crush Marr and his quisling defence of the fallible mush that is human intelligence. Marr is fortunate to have @rhysnicholson and @traceyspicer, sure. But a fish rots from the head. We are quietly confident. And bribing @yumichild the host and adjudicator just to make sure.
Come along it’s at the Town Hall 8pm … tickets through @sydwritersfest.
Alert!! New exhibition “The Other Twin” by @deborahpaauwe … terrific photographer with @gagprojects in Adelaide … always such a thoughtful listener to the complicity of children with each other and (one senses) the survival of hard things … she is great. Check her profile for deets …. Congratulations on the show – love it!
Is there anything you would like to change about classical music?”
ACO Cello Julian Thompson: “The deferential nature of concert-going that we have in the modern world, which is a totally recent invention. It never used to be like that when you went to a concert in Beethoven’s time.”
@chat10looks3 hosts, @annabelcrabb and @leigh_sales have been grilling Julian about the handiest tricks and biggest secrets in the classical music trade for @sydneymorningherald.
Annabel and Leigh will join us on stage in Brisbane, Sydney and Melbourne next month in ‘For the Love of Music’ – where there’ll be plenty more where that came from!
‘For the Love of Music’, 8, 9 & 12 April at @atqpac, @sydneyoperahouse and @artscentremelbourne.
#AustralianChamberOrchestra
J had this weird dream that last night I met this INCREDIBLE woman at the @adelaidecabaret festival and she played a SAW on stage and was generally just an EXPLOSION of genius wait it was REAL and if you’re in Adelaide you can watch her sing and play a million instruments and take her amazing brain for a walk with some other highly gifted maniacs, swipe for details but please please don’t miss her … @victoria_falconer … the Bang Bang show sounds brilliant and features @juliazemiro omg so much width to the fabric and feel the quality. My home town shining like a diamond right now ❤️
This is what my latest month of pods looks like… I’ve talked about some of them already on @chat10looks3 but want to give a special shout out to the circled one – Hey History! It’s designed for kids 8-12 and it’s hosted by 14yo Axel Clark who is a lovely natural broadcaster with a curious mind … the pod investigates everything from the Gold Rush to FN classrooms and it’s a real treat. Designed to complement the Australian history curriculum too. And the crafty genius of @clarewrighthistorian is in the mix … one of Australias great storytellers. It’s a peach. Download it for when ya stuck in weekend sport traffic.
Oh – while we’re talking about pods, on today’s News Daily podcast (subscribe on whatever pod platform you employ or through ABC Listen, News Daily is hosted by the excellent @samanthahawleyabc and is a nice nuggety-sized daily shot of news analysis) I have a chat about Kamala Harris, cat ladies and the things that happen to female politicians when they seek@power in their own right. Sorry you can hear my budgies in the background. Did I smuggle them into the studio? Does that make me a … oh never mind.
Just over two weeks to go before we share the stage with these legends.
@annabelcrabb and @leigh_sales are bringing their @chat10looks3 humour and insightful questions to @richardtognetti.aco and the Australian Chamber Orchestra in ‘For the Love of Music’, an evening featuring sublime pieces of classical music interspersed by some interviews with our musicians.
8-12 April, in Brisbane, Sydney and Melbourne. Book tickets at aco.com.au or via the link in our bio.
#AustralianChamberOrchestra
