No Place like home - Plein air painting in Millers Point

Today's painting on the easel of my deck gallery feels appropriate for these uncertain times when many people have been confined to their home in unexpected lockdown and have been rethinking many things they previously took for granted. Such as the relationship between the individual,the community and the government.

Plein air painting on site with protest banner
MP22 '67 Lower Fort st - This is my home'
2014 oil on canvas 46 x 61cm
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What makes a house a home?

Is it just a place, or is there something a bit more intangible and numinous?

Why is where you live so important?

Plein air painting on site with protest banner
MP22 '67 Lower Fort st - This is my home'
2014 oil on canvas 46 x 61cm
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I had been painting the East Darling Harbour Wharves for at least a decade before the development of Barangaroo so radically transformed the nature of the western side of the Sydney CBD. Long before the consequences of the end of Sydney's Working Harbour were understood by the general public, I could see the knock-on effect and how it would change the shape of people's lives.

I increasingly started to paint in the streets of the Rocks and Millers Point,knowing that the departure of the heavy industry and shipping would leave this area once again vulnerable to developers and the government. Only a couple of decades earlier, similar pressures had been faced, and the push back from an alliance of residents and unions culminated in the Green Bans led by the revered Jack Mundey AO. Some redevelopment ensued, but residents were relocated into purpose-built social housing in the Sirius Apartments, and Millers Point mostly held its ground.

But this time seemed different.

Millers Point, a historic harbourside enclave with 19th-century terraced houses is only a stone's throw from the Sydney Harbour Bridge, Walsh Bay Wharves and the former East Darling Harbour Wharves (now Barangaroo).

The grand terraces of Lower Fort Street perch on the escarpment overlooking the Walsh Bay Wharves. They spent the last century owned by the Harbour Trust in its various manifestations, and run as 'residentials' for waterside workers. The wharves, stores and workers' housing were completely integrated. The tight knit community was composed of people whose families had worked on the wharves, in some cases over 5 generations.

Plein air painting on site with protest banner
MP22 '67 Lower Fort st - This is my home'
2014 oil on canvas 46 x 61cm
Enquiries

In the 1980s the Millers Point residences passed from the control of the Maritime Services Board to that of the Department of Housing and there was a noticeable decline in service, repairs and maintenance of the properties.

In 2012 the NSW government decided that almost 300 public housing properties at Millers Point must be sold saying the revenue would contribute to the public housing budget although how exactly the money will be spent hasn’t yet been made transparent.

Plein air painting on site with protest banner
 MP22 '67 Lower Fort st - This is my home'
2014 oil on canvas 46 x 61cm
Enquiries

You could easily tell which houses were still inhabited. Banners were hung over balconies, spray painted onto sheets in stencil letters: 'Millers Point Not 4 Sale'; 'Say No to the Total Sell Off of Public Assets'.

The ubiquitous Reg Mombassa designed protest T shirt of a skull smoking a cigar and wearing a top hat, flapped from every washing line.

I painted a series of canvases recording the protests.

Plein air painting on site with protest banner
 MP22 '67 Lower Fort st - This is my home'
2014 oil on canvas 46 x 61cm
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The most creative protest banner was a washing line "This is my Home" on the corner of lower Fort Street and Downshire Lane in the shadow of the Harbour Bridge. It summed up every emotion and argument in a single pithy line.

As I painted this, I became friends with its author, Sally.

The artist on site with the local wildlfe
while plein air painting on site

I adore lizards, especially blue tongues, and was very happy when Sally lent me her blue tongue lizard to cuddle. To protect it from the local cats, it had a refuge in the garbage bin left lying on its side. I'd wondered why the bins were apparently scattered randomly on the tree stumps, and then realized they were lizard havens filled with rocks, food and water for 6 out of 7 days, and only used briefly for their original purpose.

I returned to paint a much larger canvas, but soon after, some low life stole Sally's T shirts. She replaced them with a set of towels with another appropriate and thought-provoking motto,  "Age in place" stencilled on them.

Sally was a real character. Despite almost unbearable daily pressure from the authorities, she had the moxie to take the Government to court to try to remain in the home she had lived in for over 30 years.

Unfortunately after putting up a spirited fight, she eventually lost the case and was relocated against her will.

Related Posts

Millers Point Three years On

(Vanessa Berry's blog 'Mirror Sydney'- with a photo of me painting in High Street)

"Millers Point through the Looking Glass "Clearing House

CLEARING HOUSE is the Tenants' Union of NSW's record of what's going on in Social and Affordable Housing portfolio redevelopment and renewal in New South Wales. They asked my permission to use my painting on this site.

Millers Point from the top of the Harbour Control Tower

Tie a yellow ribbon

There goes the neighbourhood

Walsh Bay History - Paintings of a passing Port

Tie a yellow ribbon

Today's painting on the deck gallery is a streetscape of Merriman Street, Millers Point.

These colourful terraces are just next to the Barangaroo Headland Park, and at the time of painting, still lay in the shadow of the now demolished Harbour Control Tower, which actually used to have an entrance on Merriman street directly opposite the terraces in this canvas. The Palisade Hotel is just at the end of the street.

They face west and I caught them in the full light of the setting sun to enhance their faded gelato colours so reminiscent of the dilapidated charm of urban Cuba. I kept expecting to hear the Buenavista Social Club from every doorway.

They also reminded me of streetscapes by Jeffrey Smart and Edward Hopper. Behind the colourful facade is a threatening storm.

I painted this canvas 'en plein air' in 2014 during the protests of the Millers Point residents against their forced eviction from the area. 

 

MP11 'Merriman st' 2014
oil on canvas 46 x 61cm
Available

Sharp eyed viewers will be able to see yellow ribbons tied to the doors. A yellow ribbon had been used to mark a building destined for demolition, during the original Rocks clearances in the late 19th - early 20th century. The current residents adopted and repurposed this symbol to signal a building where the occupants were threatened with eviction.

MP11 'Merriman st' 2014
oil on canvas 46 x 61cm
Available

The early 20th century slum clearances in Millers Point and the Rocks were performed under the pretext of saving the city from bubonic plague. The early 21st century clearances were of the community rather than the architecture, under the guise of economic rationalism.
First the maritime workforce, then the surrounding community was dispersed.

Until recently, the inner city had been regarded as a crowded, squalid slum, so the rich flocked to the suburbs. Now this has reversed, and the poor are pushed to the periphery. The city is spoilt rotten for resources and transport, while the hinterland has been starved.

MP11 'Merriman st' 2014
oil on canvas 46 x 61cm
Available

The value of Millers Point didn’t just lie in its architecture, but in its strong community spirit and long history.

Nearly 200 years of its colourful maritime past has been swept away with barely a token gesture to its previous existence.

Since this canvas was painted, most of Millers Point has passed into private hands, and many of the workers cottages were transformed into short term rental Air B'n'B. Ironically, due to another outbreak of plague (Covid 19 this time, not bubonic) almost exactly a century later, these short term rentals are now mostly vacant and from March to mid June 2020 the Isolation restrictions turned Millers Point into a ghost town.

Related posts

The Mother Art is Architecture

Banners, Millers Point

In the shadow of the Bridge -Night Observatory Hill

Today's painting on the deck gallery is a nocturne painted from Observatory Hill.

O15 Night, The Rocks from Observatory Hill
2000 oil on canvas 84 x 112cm
Available
I've often painted the Rocks and Millers Point from this vantage point.
When I used to teach art classes, I'd give everyone a map of the best spots to sit so they could avoid having to include the Blues Point Tower!

O15 Night, The Rocks from Observatory Hill
2000 oil on canvas 84 x 112cm
Available

This view looks straight down Lower Fort Street where I have also frequently painted the heritage terraces, the Garrison church, the Harbourview and 'Hero of Waterloo' hotels.

Some of this collection are on my Miller's Point page in this blog.

It's a postcard perfect Sydney Harbour scene during the day. but at night the shadows make it evocative and mysterious.
The tales from the rowdy and sometimes sinister era of the Rocks 'Push' don't seem to be quite as distant at night!

O15 Night, The Rocks from Observatory Hill
2000 oil on canvas 84 x 112cm

Related Posts

Vivid

No Place like home

Tie a yellow Ribbon

Darling House, Millers Point- It's not dear it's darling

Darling House, at 8-12 Trinity Avenue, Millers Point, is an exquisitely restored Georgian-style Old Colonial sandstone building only a stone's throw from the Sydney Harbour Bridge. It's as sweetly pretty as the proverbial chocolate box. But it has a chequered past, & more than its fair share of scandal, conflict & controversy. 

The land upon which Darling House now stands was granted to Susanna Ward by Governor Darling in 1823 and transferred to Susanna Elizabeth Douglas in 1831. The name of the house refers to the original land grant by Governor Darling.

MP28 'Darling House' 2014 

oil on canvas 51 x 41cm

Available for sale

 

 

 

 

Previously there had been a sandstone quarry on this site & the convict hand carved sandstone blocks from which the house is built were probably from the original quarry.

 The current sandstone building now standing on the site was built over an earlier structure built in the early 1830s. Darling House retains traces of the foundations, retaining walls, stonework, cobbled paving and part of a brick cavity wall from the original building. The existing sandstone house now known as "Darling House" was built by Joseph Farris in 1842, during a period of financial depression in Sydney. It was a large fashionable house of 8 rooms (when most houses in Millers Point were only 2-4 rooms). With the increasing number of wealthy merchants and wharf owners moving into Millers Point and Dawes Point, it became an affluent enclave, with Argyle and Lower Fort Streets known as 'Quality Row.'

Farris was a well known publican, holding licences for the Whalers Arms Hotel on the corner of Windmill Street & Lower Fort Street, the Young Princess Hotel (now the Hero of Waterloo) and the Shakespeare Hotel. It seems that Farris never lived at Darling House, but leased it out to various middle-class, educated residents, including artists, musicians, teachers and police officers. 

During the 1860s the ground and first floor Victorian verandas were added, & the first floor windows were converted into French doors. English bald faced buildings give little protection against the sun while the French doors and veranda allowed for greater air circulation through the house during summer. Australian architectural styles were forced to change from traditional English styles to adapt to the vastly different Australian climate. 

Caraher's Stairs, named after Owen Joseph Caraher, a local soap merchant, was built in 1857. These flanked the northern wall of Darling House & gave access up to Princes Street (now the site of the Sydney Harbour Bridge) making a thoroughfare between Millers Point and the CBD. However there were many complaints that it was the haunt of thugs & street gangs, the infamous Rocks 'Push'. During the construction of the Sydney Harbour Bridge, Caraher's Stairs were demolished. There are still small remnants of this lost stairway at the northern boundary of Darling House. A fragment of the original material, part of the original sandstone side wall and coping remain, and a darker colour to the brickwork on the building that was built while the stairway existed shows the outline of the stairway.

The Farris family leased the property out, until after the outbreak of bubonic plague in 1901, it was resumed by the Sydney Harbour Trust. The Sydney Harbour Trust resumed almost every property in The Rocks, Millers Point & Darling Harbour between 1900 and 1902 to set quarantine measures in place. As many houses, even streets were demolished at this time, Darling House was lucky to survive. However, the area went rapidly down market & upon resumption, the Sydney Harbour Trust converted Darling House into a boarding house. One of the most notorious residents was Rosaleen Norton, the so-called 'Witch of Kings Cross', who lived in Darling House in the early 1900s. She scandalized the society of Sydney when she published her 'satanic' drawings in local tabloids.

 In 1948-49 Darling House was converted into a warehouse, resulting in the demolition of most of the internal walls and outbuildings on the property to allow vehicle access to the back of the house. The house was then leased to various commercial companies. 

The last known commercial tenant of Darling House was Lep Transport who installed a petrol tank and bowser. After they left the property became vacant and increasingly dilapidated.

“The Rocks Cottage Type Hospital” (later Darling House) was the first major project of the newly formed Millers Point Resident Action Group (MPRAG) in 1975. After much community effort a lease was signed with the State for the site in 1983. During that time funds were raised through “raffles and jumble sales of  chocolate wheels, and games of housie.” (Darling House – A Community Achievement – Shirley Fitzgerald 2015 )

By 1993 the Committee had capital funding of $500,000 from the Federal government approved. The State Liberal government promised a matching amount, the City Council promised $20,000 and a matching $20,000 from the community. At that time the State Housing Commission “couldn’t believe the value they got for their $500,000.” (Shirley Fitzgerald)

In 1994 Darling House underwent extensive renovations under the design of heritage architect Howard Tanner, including the construction of a new dwelling on the southern allotment, in order to convert the house into an aged care facility. The conversion into an aged care facility was a community initiative of MPRAG in Partnership with the Rocks Cottage Type Nursing Home Committee. It was a community funded and supported organization from the time of its opening on 4 October 1994 until 2015. In 2014 the State Government decided to sell 293 Government owned houses in Millers Point and Dawes Point to private purchasers. In 2015 the State Government of New South Wales decided that instead of a “peppercorn” rent of $50 p.a. the full market rent would be charged – hundreds of thousands of dollars. This led to the closure of the aged care facility in 2015, just twenty years after it had opened, and its subsequent sale..

Apart from the uncosted community time and effort in 'sweat equity', specific payments of over $200,000 have been noted, as well as about $500,000 for ongoing maintenance.

In February 2016  Darling House property was purchased for $7.7 million from the New South Wales Land and Housing Corporation at public auction by Dr Shane Moran. MPRAG was not reimbursed for their time, effort or money spent. It has been estimated that at least 20% of the value of the property & probably more, was directly attributable to the efforts of MPRAG, so they should have been reimbursed over $1.5 million from the sale. 

But this didn't happen, & the residents were furious at their betrayal by the State Government.

Since its acquisition by Provectus Care in 2016, the property has been refurbished into a boutique luxury retirement home. The extensive restoration has preserved Darling House’s original Georgian features  including original Victorian marble fireplaces, historic lead-light windows and period joinery.

However, Mr John McInerney, Chairman of MPRAG, said that although he wasn't opposed to the new aged care facility he was angered that the New South Wales government "has taken a community facility, cashed it in for $7 million odd dollars and has now made it inaccessible to the bulk of residents around here".

 

Related posts 

 

Tie a yellow ribbon 

 

No place like home 

 

Stairway to nowhere 

 

Another one bites the dust 

 

There goes the neighbourhood 

 

Banners, Millers Point 

Vivid

I have an exhibition of paintings inspired by 'Vivid' now on display at the Four Seasons Hotel, 199 George Street, The Rocks, Sydney.

This hotel is almost 'Vivid Headquarters'.

It is only 100 metres from the best vantage points to view the spectacular lighting the sails of the Opera House, and the facade of the Museum of Contemporary Art.

'Vivid - Sydney Harbour Bridge  from Lavender Bay (Rainbow lights)' 2015 oil on canvas 102 x 200cm
SOLD
Enquiries about other Sydney Harbour paintings

Brett Whiteley often painted the magnificent view from Lavender Bay. 

It looks even better at night, however I don't think that many other artists have painted nocturnes of Sydney Harbour.

'Vivid - Lighting the Sails-Luna Park on the Opera House'

2015 oil on canvas 152 x 122cm

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Of all the images projected onto the sails of the Opera House, my favourite would be Luna Park.
It revives memories of the cheeky imagery by Martin Sharp, Peter Kingston and other larrikin ratbag artists who revered and helped defend Luna Park.

Painting inspired by Vivid festival hanging
in the Four Seasons Hotel in The Rocks Sydney -
From left to right :
'Vivid - Lighting the Sails-Luna Park on the Opera House'
2015 oil on canvas 152 x 122cm
'Fireship' oil on paper 136 x 112cm
'Fireship' oil on canvas 61 x 91cm

Enquiries

The angle of the lighting on the painting has cast a faint rainbow as a halo above the span of the Bridge.

See more at the Ultimate Art Gallery
Four Seasons Hotel Sydney
199 George St, Sydney NSW 2000 Australia
P.O Box 1347, Crows Nest NSW 2065
Phone: +61 (4) 35 844 347
Email: info@ultimateart.com.au

Related Posts

In the shadow of the Bridge - Night Observatory Hill

Painting the International Fleet Review Part 2

There goes the neighbourhood

MP9 'Millers Point, Barangaroo
and the Harbour Tower from High st'
oil on canvas 61 x 183cm 2014
Enquiries

In my new exhibition, "Under the Hammer"  at the Frances Keevil Gallery there is a large and pretty panoramic canvas of High Street.
At first sight, it looks peaceful. Charming enough to put on the cover of a chocolate box.
Does it remind you of the Impressionists perhaps? Pissaro, even early Monet?
To the right is a charming row of Federation houses in dappled shade.
But there are undercurrents. All is not well.

There is a sharp sudden drop to the street below.

Behind a camouflaging line of trees there is turmoil. Machinery lurks in the background; inexplicable concrete structures and mounds of debris peek through.

A road carves through the centre to the horizon.

It divides the past from the future.

Welcome to Barangaroo.

MP9 'Millers Point, Barangaroo
and the Harbour Tower from High st'
oil on canvas 61 x 183cm 2014
Enquiries

Millers Point always had a raffish edge. It was a tough little quarter, the oldest suburb in Australia, and coincidentally its earliest slum. For over 200 years it was the heart of maritime Sydney, as ships loaded wheat, wool and coal at the Fingerwharves that fringed the Harbour from Woolloomooloo to Blackwattle Bay.

MP9 'Millers Point, Barangaroo
and the Harbour Tower from High st'
 oil on canvas 61 x 183cm 2014
Enquiries

Now it is undergoing a painful and cataclysmic metamorphosis. Every vestige of its colourful past will be swept away. 

 Including the people.

The artist painting MP9 'Millers Point, Barangaroo
and the Harbour Tower from High st'
oil on canvas 61 x 183cm 2014
Enquiries

Social cleansing is not a new policy dating from our own era of economic rationalism. It’s been here before.
In January 1900, the bubonic plague first broke out in Sydney, carried by rats from the ships. Millers Point was popularly considered to be a festering slum, inhabited by social undesirables living in ignorance poverty and filth. This was all the excuse the government needed for a massive program of slum clearance that went well beyond simple health precautions. 

Painting MP9 'Millers Point. Barangaroo
and the Harbour Tower from High st'
oil on canvas 61 x 183cm 2014
Enquiries

This attitude permitted those with political or commercial interests at heart to promote resumption of property in the name of morality and hygiene. To “purge” the city of perceived social ills, whole city blocks were cordoned off, many houses and even whole streets were demolished.The entire waterfront was put in lockdown until it resembled a quarantined war-zone.
The idea of a “tabula rasa” – a clean sheet, a blank canvas, has always been very seductive to planners. Development through decay, dereliction then destruction is the familiar theme running through Sydney’s history.
Throughout the plague and clearances, yellow ribbons were tied to the doors of houses with infected people inside, or on the doors of houses due for demolition, to mark danger.

Painting MP9 'Millers Point, Barangaroo
and the Harbour Tower from High st'
oil on canvas 61 x 183cm 2014
Enquiries

One hundred years later, the area was yet again in danger. It only escaped complete demolition due to the heated campaign by activists, residents and the Green Bans imposed by Jack Mundey and the NSW Builders' Labourers Federation.
As the maritime industry declined and was forced to the periphery of Sydney, the wharves were given a makeover to become upmarket apartments and an entertainment precinct. In 1985 ownership of public housing was removed from the Maritime Services Board and taken over by the Department of Housing. Yet a tiny enclave of the old working-class Sydney community still exists.
The phrase “spirit of place” is often overused, but how else can you describe it? People whose families had worked on the wharves, in some cases over 5 generations, are still clinging there precariously, in the houses they had lived in all their lives.

Sunset, Millers Point. 
 MP9 'Millers Point Barangaroo
 and the Harbour Tower from High st'
 oil on canvas 61 x 183cm 2014 
with another half finished panorama
of the same size of High Street
and Barangaroo on my easel.
Enquiries

There has been extraordinary pressure exerted to gentrify the area. A six-star hotel and high-rollers casino are planned for Barangaroo, only a stone’s throw away.
The first auctions of 293 public housing properties at Millers Point and The Rocks have begun. Ironically this will even include the Sirius apartment complex, which had been specifically built to house residents displaced during the previous development push.
There is no guarantee the proceeds will be quarantined from general revenue to build new public housing in the area or even close to the CBD.
Millers Point residents will have to go within two years, coincidentally when Barangaroo will open.

Close up detail of gate with yellow ribbon
 on house in High Street 
MP9 'Millers Point Barangaroo
and the Harbour Tower from High st' 
oil on canvas 61 x 183cm 2014
Enquiries

The yellow ribbons are back, tied to the doors and gates, to warn of an old danger in a new form.
Plus ça change, plus ça meme chose.

Painting MP9 'Millers Point, Barangaroo
and the Harbour Tower from High st'
oil on canvas 61 x 183cm 2014
Enquiries

Remember, when you admire the Impressionists, that they painted during the forced clearances of inner city Paris by the despotic town planner Baron Haussmann.
If you look carefully, their paintings are full of clues. Those elegant Parisian boulevardes painted by Caillebotte, are wounds inflicted on the city when small laneways were bulldozed, and the residents evicted.
Montmarte, too steep for easy access, escaped this homogenization, and was still full of crooked narrow lanes and cheap housing. Many fled there, including some impoverished artists who later became the world famous icons of Impressionist art.
Their paintings don’t look so “chocolate box” now, do they?

Close up detail showing the

partly obscured "Barangaroo" sign 
MP9 'Millers Point Barangaroo and the

Harbour Tower from High st' 
oil on canvas 61 x 183cm 2014

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To return to my painting, behind the trees is the sign of the Barangaroo development.
But the letters are partially obscured; all you can make out is “a n g ...r”.
Hidden anger? With a sugar coating.


Related articles

• Another city landmark gets the brush-off March 31, 2014 Written by Nicole Hasham State Politics reporter Sydney Morning Herald
• Millers Point Three Years On  Author : Vanessa Berry Her blog : Mirror Sydney