Sculpture By The Sea - 2013

It's that time of the year...Sculpture By the Sea has returned to shores of our beautiful and iconic Cottesloe Beach. A pristine playground that becomes a superb backdrop for 18 days of art celebration. Sun, sand, sea and sunsets, graced by the amazing talent and creativity of over 70 local, interstate and international artists. In its 9th annual exhibition, Sculpture By The Sea, seems to go from strength to strength and get bigger and more popular each year. It is expected to attract more than 220 thousand visitors over the next two and a half weeks, though I do believe they ALL came yesterday...with us! It was soooo busy, with throngs of people enjoying a sunday outing to this amazing FREE event. FREE! (Though the organisers live in hope of a gold coin donation!) There are certainly not many places where you can enjoy art with a million dollar view for next to nothing! What I love about Sculpture by The Sea is the 'people watching' as the crowds mingle through the exhibitions...especially of the children. Many of the sculptures are touch friendly and tactile and so tempting for little hands. What a brilliant way to introduce children to art on a grand scale. The whole beach becomes a giant adventure land for all ages. Yep...I do believe at some time in our past, the girl's playroom held this many plastic toys! 'Liquorice Allsorts' reminded me what to throw into the food shopping this week!! YUM. The Sculpture park also makes for some fun photo taking...the photographers, amateur, professional and everyone in between were out in force! It always surprises me just how many people own a SLR these days...and how many people now use their iPhones as their sole camera...or their iPad. iPad? That's just weird. I don't know whether it's just because I am a realist painter ...but I just don't get some of the art. Seriously...green masking tape on rocks? Please explain? I'm sure there is an explanation but without one, I'm a little lost. It seems there were one or two others who just couldn't quite get it either. Or maybe the creativity just exhausted this poor fellow. Pretty good place for a snooze anyway! Sticky tape aside, most of the sculptures were amazing! This one (see above) flashes a lightbulb in Denmark, Europe every time someone climbs inside it. Wowsers. 'Transparent Sea' is my personal favourite...made of glass on 5 panels. The light shining through it will be constantly changing. I would love to see it a sunset. Stunning. I don't know what the name of this one is, but once again it was gorgeous and perfectly positioned under the magnificent pine trees that Cottesloe is renowned for. We had a murder in our local area this weekend and the police have been out in force doing their CSI bit...Bon thought this was another crime scene!! No darling girl...its art. The dead giveaway, aside from the native grass at the beach, was a dead kangaroo, sculpted of course. Hmmm...again...why? Perth turned on a humid, sticky day for our wanderings. We are waiting, waiting for the temperature to drop and the autumn weather to arrive, but it certainly made for some prettier skies for my photos. Thank you beautiful Cottesloe Beach and Sculpture by the Sea... Friday 8th - 24th March. Dont miss it!! I've only shown you a tiny sample of the art on display, in fact, I think I need to go one more time to take it all in...minus the sunday masses! See you there... x Mia