A new perspective on the Dawny Swim

Last Sunday I got a different perspective on the Dawny Swim watching it from Cockatoo Island.

In 2011 and 2012 I took part in the 2.4 km swim from Balmain's Dawn Fraser Baths and around Cockatoo, and I was going to enter again this year.  But when I was deliberating about whether my head was in the right place to swim, my husband Bruce suggested watching it from Cockatoo Island.

"What a great idea," I said. "And then I'll know what I'm swimming around when I do it next year."

The rain bucketed down the night before the swim, and I went to bed thinking it'll be cancelled but the next morning the word on Ocean Swims was the 'Dawny' was on. We got ready quickly and caught the train into Circular Quay and then the 8.37 ferry to Cockatoo via King Street Wharf.

When we docked at Cockatoo we hurried across to the eastern side of the island for the start of the swim. As the first of the swimmers came towards us I realised I was not in the best spot to get good shots. I wanted to get closer to the submarine crane on the edge of the island but that area was cordoned off and there were signs saying 'Keep out."

Bruce went to find a better spot and then I noticed a gap in the fence and squeezed in.  I stood near the crane and took photos of the first swimmers to reach the island led out by Mick on a kayak, who told me it wasn't cold in.

I followed the red, blue, green and yellow caps along the side of the island and then spotted my squad friend Sue in black.

"Sue, Sue," I called out and she stopped for a second and waved back.

And then I decided it was time to get out of this cordoned off area but before I could find a gap in the fence three men arrived on the scene. They wanted to know how I got in and demanded to see some ID, which I didn't have as it was in the backpack with Bruce. I told them I only came in to photograph the people doing the swim. "Show us your photos," they said. I clicked through until they were satisfied there were no shots of their timber crates, just of the swim. "It's illegal what you did," they said to me as I hurried away.  "Sorry, I won't do it again," I said.

When I reached Bruce he showed me where the competitors had swum under the wharf instead of the usual route around it. "I might get claustrophobic swimming under there," I said.

We realised the first swimmers would almost have reached the other side of the island so we hurried to get a good vantage spot; passing the rows of tents and old beam bending machines used to make massive plates to build the hulls of ships that reminded me of the statues on Easter Island.

We jogged through a tunnel carved out of the sandstone in 1915, later modified to become an air-raid shelter during World War II.

We emerged from the tunnel near the old Sutherland Dock completed in 1890, and hurried down to the Camber Wharf that faces the Dawn Fraser Baths and White Horse Point.

We made it in time to see the first swimmers complete their circumnavigation of the island. As they increased their pace and powered back to the jetty, the sky turned a deep grey and the rain started to fall. The visibility rapidly reduced and we noticed a few swimmers wide out from the island drifting towards Drummoyne and the Iron Cove Bridge.  Fortunately the boats and kayakers directed them back on course like cattle dogs herding sheep. 

When the rain got heavier Bruce decided it was time to take shelter, and for awhile we stayed dry in a stone building that used to be a shipwright's shed.

Eventually the rain eased and I headed back to the wharf where a group of swimmers were discussing the right way to way to go. "Head to the yellow buoy," said John on a kayak, who paddled over to me for a chat.

"What's it like in," I asked. "It's a bit choppy around the bend there," he said, "but the water temperature is good." And then I spotted Sue again and a bit later Jude, another one of the group that swims evening squad at Leichhardt Pool.

As we waited for the last swimmers to emerge around the bend, the rain stopped and the sky returned to a light grey.  Seagulls gathered on the edge and squawked as we watched a yellow cap man amble in. He was in last place but Bruce was impressed with his relaxed style and reckoned he was going to overtake the others in front of him.

As the tailenders completed the swim we walked back to the northern side for something to eat.

Revived after our coffee and bacon and eggs, we explored some of the 18 hectares of space full of crinums and jacarandas in flower, timber and sandstone, iron and tin, and buildings from the island's convict, ship-building and maritime past.

And now it's a place where every second year the Biennale is held, where campers come and stay overnight, where seagulls nest, where films are made, and where you can have a game of lawn tennis or stay in one of the renovated, original buildings.

It's a fascinating place but when the rain started to fall again we decided we'd explore the entire island another time.

As we waited for the ferry, I thought about today's 'Dawny' swimmers and how they'd have that sense of achievement you get after an open water swim, but I was glad that this year I had a new experience watching the swim.

Anzac Day tranquility at Leichhardt Pool

On Anzac Day there was a soft Autumn light over Leichhardt Park Aquatic Centre.

The late afternoon sun glistened and sparkled in the blue water of the 50-metre pool.

When I started taking photos, a lifeguard asked me what was so interesting in the pool.

"There's all these beautiful reflections," I said.

Oh," he said, sounding unconvinced of the beauty I was finding in the 1960-era pool.

I left him staring at the water and made my way to the deep end where I discovered ... 

The lane numbers and starting blocks making patterns in the pool.

The faded colours of the high platform creating watercolours in the diving pool.

And reflecting in the 50-metre pool.

Finally I put my camera away and pushed off for a swim .

But as I swam up and down, more pictures kept appearing in the pool.

After 20 laps I brought my camera into the pool.  

And caught a few final images before the Autumn glow was gone for the day.

The art and soul of the swimming pool

Visiting some of the Art and About exhibitions and installations in Sydney last month got me thinking about art at pools. The motto of Art and About is 'art in unusual places', and from 21 September to 21 October that's what you find in the city's parks, lane ways, streets and malls.

 

"We try every year to use places we haven't used before," said creative director Gill Minervini in an article in The Sydney Morning Herald. "We're always looking for new spots," she said. 

If Minervini and her team considered pools they would find that art is already a feature at a number of centres. 

By the 50-metre pool at Cook and Phillip Park Aquatic Centre in the city are eight murals by Sydney artist Wendy Sharpe depicting the life of Australian swimmer and performer Annette Kellerman.

The 'bold and sensual' studies tell the story of key events in the life of the 'Diving Venus' including becoming NSW 100 yards freestyle champion in 1902 and competing in the annual Parisian swimming race on the Seine.  Other panels portray her arrest for indecent exposure on a Boston Beach for wearing her self-created one-piece cossies,  her daring and exotic aquatic feats in shows around the world, and her rise to stardom in silent movies like the mythological underwater film Neptune's Daughter.

Swimming a slow backstroke is a relaxing way to view the paintings and take in the life of this trail-blazing Australian, who believed emancipating women from the chains of neck-to-knee swimming costumes was her greatest achievement!

Another pool with an artistic side is Leichhardt Park Aquatic Centre in Sydney's inner west.

In the native garden leading to the entrance are seven glass installations by Bronwyn Bancroft honouring the original indigenous people of the area. 

Called 'Weavings of Light and Life' they represent the land and foreshore, food collection, fishing, song-lines, kinship, a shield protecting lands and family, and water.

 

The Bundjalung artist said she deliberately chose glass as the medium for the panels so that the sun's rays would interact with the designs throughout the day. The works also connect beautifully with the native plants around them and are a colourful welcome to visitors to the pool.

A few kilometres up the road, a striking blue mosaic welcomes patrons to the Annette Kellerman Aquatic Centre at Enmore Park.

Near the entrance a chrome-plated brass ribbon designed by artist Julia Davis wraps around the building, connecting with the surface of the pool and reflecting the light and movement of the water.

In the foyer area is a glass sculpture inspired by the figure of Marrickville-born Annette Kellerman. Created by local artist Mark Wotherspoon, Silver Screen Mermaid depicts the shapely curves of a mermaid figure.

The almost two-year-old centre also features a remnant of a mosaic from the original Enmore Pool. It's displayed in one of the pool's outdoor areas and shows people of all ages communicating, diving and relaxing around water. It also features greetings in community languages.

The use of vibrant colours, spots and stripes and interesting shapes gives the centre a lively and creative edge that appropriately reflects the artistic spirit of its namesake.

I wonder if next year's Art and About will venture into the aquatic spaces of the public pool?

Underwater with Narelle Autio, Persephone and me

A favourite game among my friends back in the 1970s at Northbridge Baths was to dare each other to dive under the suspended starting blocks and come up the other side.

The bottom of the blocks was often covered in moss, so it was bit like venturing into a dark, slightly disorientating world. I was always a bit fearful I would get stuck among the moss and slime, and so was reluctant to attempt the dare.  I would duck-dive to the bottom of the blocks but never went any further – afraid of where I might end up – maybe in a completely different world.

I was reminded of this experience when I saw Australian photographer Narelle Autio’s exhibition Water Hole at the Stills Gallery in Sydney last week. The focus of her images is the underwater world of billabongs, rivers and swimming holes in remote areas of Queensland, the Northern Territory and Western Australia.  Her photos are copyright so I can't show them in this post but if you click here you can view her latest show.

Narelle is known for her photos of the sea and the bodies that inhabit watery spaces. While her earlier works “celebrated the restorative powers of the coast”, Water Hole explores “a mysterious and shadowy place beyond ordinary human experience”.

As the exhibition program says: “The distance between above and below the surface is more than merely physical. Here underwater landscapes contain an element of dark fantasy, like the mythological underworld of Persephone. Plant life rises, waxy and gnarled in texture like sculptural forms, weed scratches the surface of the visual plane like abstract expressionist drips of paint and uncountable hexagons of light seem to equally construct the images from dots and as they fleck and obliterate their surfaces.”

Maybe it was that mythological underworld that I sensed as I approached the bottom of the blocks at the baths.  While I was hesitant about that underwater game, I had no fear of swimming beneath the surface in other parts of the salt water tidal pool. I loved diving under and observing the schools of fish, jelly blubbers or the occasional sting ray that drifted under the pylons into the pool.

Another favourite activity was to see who could swim the furthest underwater without taking a breath. I think about 20 metres was about as far as we could go. In her beautiful book, Swimming Studies, Leanne Shapton writes about doing "lungbusters, fifty metres underwater"!

"We push off at one end and glide, then kick soundlessly through the blue. At the far end we release the air in our lungs, and our bubbles rush up in a muffled crash. As our heads break the surface, the pool echoes with our breathing. The whole process is overseen by the silent sweep of the pace clock swallowing time, rest, and seconds of air before we inhale and slip under again."

One of the drills at my swim-fit sessions at Leichhardt Park Aquatic Centre is to dolphin kick underwater for 25 metres. Unlike Leanne Shapton I never manage to stay under for the distance despite the assistance of flippers but I enjoy the sensation of moving like a sea creature along the pale blue tiles at the bottom of the pool. Other times I submerge into the quiet of the underwater world and delight in the patterns of sunlight that beam down.

And one day I might venture to the other side of the world - not dive beneath the blocks - but to the bottom of the ocean floor to witness one of Jason de Caires Taylor's extraordinary underwater sculptures in the waters off the West Indies island of Grenada or near Cancun, Mexico.  Maybe there I might just meet Persephone?