Textile inspired Public Art

We had to go to Midland this morning to pick up a computer and bits to add to the next shipment to the Zimbabwe school. While we were there we decided to visit the Midland Railway Workshops.

From 1904 until it was closed in 1994, the workshops provided employment for thousands of Western Australians. A part of the site is now a museum and guided tours are offered on Tuesdays, Thursdays and Sundays - unfortunately only to people who are wearing closed in shoes. It being close to 35 degrees Celsius we weren’t , so that is something that we will do another day. We both love industrial museums.

The larger part of the site is being redeveloped.

We went to the Coal Dam. This part of the site is rapidly filling with upmarket houses, which face onto the park around the dam itself. The dam is fed by an artesian bore and there are remnants of the bridge constructions that used to go from one end of the dam to the other. The artesian water is now channelled to fountain out from the bridges. It is both impressive and attractive. Unfortunately we didn’t take a camera. [Memo to self: do not leave the house without one in future.]

The story behind the dam is fascinating. Because the coal that was used in locomotives for the first half of last century was brown or sub-bitumous coal from Collie, it had to be stored carefully or it would spontaneously combust. The storage solution was the dam. Coal would be dumped in there and then taken out as required, hence the need for the bridges.

One of the features of the whole site, both the restored section and the redeveloped part, is its public art.

I particularly liked a laser cut steel archway by WA artist Anne Neil in the Coal Dam Park.
“The doorway is the threshold to the house and the garden, and also links the two. The see-through, lace-like pattern . . . is intended to be a very feminine piece, with its origins in rich embroidery design and pattern making” . Quote from 8 art projects, Midland Redevelopment Authority. I had hoped to put in some photos that I scanned from that publication but Blogger won't let me upload them.

So no fibre today, but art inspired by fibre.