Welcome to Auckland’s original ‘Municipal Destructor’. Everyone, like me, know it as Victoria Park Market – a super popular open air market through the 80's to 2000's – a great place to buy your crystals and tie-dies etc! I've always known that it was originally the city rubbish dump – when the city was waaaay smaller). There is more to the story, of course. It was originally created in reaction to a bubonic plague scare in Sydney. For sanitary reasons it was built to burn Auckland’s rubbish and waste while using the heat generated to provide electricity to power the city. Sounds pretty clever eh, and I guess we were plague free. However, we must have been breathing some seriously toxic smoke fumes! That 38 metre tall chimney must have helped a little but don't forget all the horse manure and night carts, they were definitely smellier times. The municipal destructor is now a gentrified place that's home to restaurants and businesses, like the superb Milenta restau...
If you're like me and feeling disconsolate because your budget doesn't stretch to Lisbon for the USk Symposium, don't worry, you can follow it online! Follow the symposium online here, follow the blog to 'Meet the Instructors' who include some of Portugals finest sketch and reportage artists (amongst many others), and follow the daily blog posts during the symposium. The blog will feature daily updates by fellow Urban Sketchers contributor Joao Pinheiro of Brazil.
For some strange reason, the Portugese seem to be particularly good with a pencil, so check out some of my personal favourites, Jaoa Catarhino here and Eduardo Salavisa, here.
The symposium will be taking place in central Lisbon, where history exudes from the very pores of the place - from the winding cobbled alleyways of the Roman and Moorish Alfama, the Rio Tejo (or river Tagus), faded azulejo walled palaces, castles and cathedrals. So be prepared to be treated to some superb sketches!
Comments