Enmore and Stanmore

Marian Street and Marian Lane, Enmore on Monday, 24 February 2020

Late afternoon and sunny weather with a few fluffy clouds. Marian Lane features the back walls and garage doors of houses in Marian and Metropolitan Street. Lots of doves on the powerlines. Two schoolgirls are walking along slowly. Someone in the far distance is shaking out his carpet. The stop sign at an intersection is upside down. People leave things for others to take, a packet of clay, a printer wrapped in plastic with the sign ‘free to take’, a box with toy fruit and veggies that said something like ‘never used’ or ‘never opened’. 

Marian Street has shops and graffiti at the end towards Enmore Road and then starts to be quiet, tree-lined, and relaxed. Nice houses, all old, well kept, different styles. All the same trees, I think a type of bottle brush, not in flower at the moment, so not sure. I thought it would be great to live in this beautiful, green street and have all the shops, cafés, pubs, and the Enmore Theatre just around the corner. 

Myrtle Street and Lane, Stanmore on Monday, 2 March 2020

Late afternoon, the weather just changed from very hot to very windy and a lot cooler. There is a Catholic Primary school on one street corner, and another Catholic institution further along. ‘Sisters of Mercy’ with the invitation ‘all welcome’ or similar. There is a gallery on the first street corner I came to. Houses are old, in good condition, painted and decorated, nice gardens. A group of young people is waiting at the door of one of the houses. People come home with their children from school or daycare, and other people come home from work in their Mercedes and Audis, using the garage doors in Myrtle Lane West. They get out of their cars, still in office suits, to take in the rubbish bins. The lanes are a bit confusing. They don’t have street names displayed. The planes fly low, making huge screaming noises. A white fashionable dog walks purposefully along the footpath all by herself. A woman seems to be concerned, but it’s not her dog. She gives up.   

Graffiti in May Lane

May Street and May Lane, St Peters on Sunday, 23 Feb 2020

I often drive through May Street when I go to Marrickville, and I took photos in the area for other projects in the past. Tugi and Dianna have their framing workshop Graphic Art Mount in May Lane where at least half of Sydney’s artists get their exhibition framing done, including me. May Lane is known for its graffiti. Tugi made the best out of this fact and invited street artists a few years back to do graffiti on the walls officially, like a proper exhibition with opening nights. There is still graffiti everywhere.

Today the shop is closed because it’s Sunday. A fair amount of people pass through the lane. Some are doing a phone video with a young woman in yellow. Some walk their dog, and some come from St Peters train station. 

May Street has a large lawn with some trees, a small playground, and a football oval. There is another green strip named “May Street Playground”. It’s a tiny bit of grass with a couple of trees and two benches. Someone left a French novel, torn jeans, and a towel.

There are artists’ studios in a red brick building and still a lot of old workshops and traders. Sadly, at a closer look, many of them have a ‘For Lease’ sign displayed. At the Country and Town Hotel end of May Street, they are just finishing the WestConnex road works of this section. 

Olive…

…and Welcome

Update on 19 June: When I edited my photos from this day, I looked up some names of the graffiti writers. One of them is called ‘Land Writer(s)’ which is an Aboriginal street art duo, making art about indigenous concerns. Most entries I’ve found were from around 2016. There was a Sydney Morning Herald article featuring a piece they did in Brisbane about black death in custody.

Sketchy notes about streets named Mabel

Sunday, 2 February 2020

Today is the first day of my project Random Discoveries. The plan is to visit randomly chosen streets of Sydney and find out what they can tell me.

But how would I make my choices?

There is a worldwide community of urban investigators. Some drift aimlessly through the city. Others follow an algorithm to find places they otherwise wouldn’t go to.

I’m going to visit streets with female names in honour of the female street explorers past and present.

I start with the letter M.

Mabel Street, Hurstville

Hot Sunday, a sleepy street with old trees. Not many people around. Two kids are running into their house. A young man is driving into a carport. Two people are talking on the footpath, and someone is working in front of his garage. Otherwise quiet, and not many cars. But the ones coming through are fast and very impatient. 

Mabel Street, Kingsgrove

It’s a very deserted street, no old trees. Some houses might date back to the 1930s, while others are new. Some are just about to be finished. Almost nobody around. One property with tall white garden gnomes attracts my attention. There is a man working in his garage, drilling. He couldn’t have heard me over the noise. Nevertheless, after I have taken a photo, he comes to his fence and looks suspiciously around. I get into my car and leave.