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Wednesday, October 26, 2011

BIG in Korea

Last year my dad made a video artwork called We dance in the studio for an exhibition at the Institute of Modern Art in Brisbane. It is a film of me dancing to Lady Gaga's Paparazzi.  The video has now been included in an international touring exhibition called Selectively Revealed that opens this week in Korea at Aram Art Gallery, Seoul. 




The gallery has decided to use my picture to promote the exhibition. It is on the catalogue and invitations
and on very BIG posters around the city and on the side of the Gallery!




Next the exhibition will go to Indonesia then to Taiwan then to Thailand. You can read more about this exhibition here:
 http://www.experimenta.org/exhibitions-projects/international.html

likes,
from Phoebe

parc de la ciutadella


We have had really beautiful weather. Mum says this is called an 'Indian summer'. Last week we took advantage of a sunny day and went to visit the Parc de la Ciutadella. This is also where the zoo is. We walked all the way along from the Arc di Triomphe into the park, where we sat in the sun and ate our bocadillo (rolls) looking at the cascada (waterfall).



We obeyed the Park rules, not feeding the birds nor releasing any of ours


There is a really large mammoth statue in the park because the park is also home to the museum of zoology.



After we climbed on it, Dad took us for a row around the lake.



It was a bit scary going under the bridge. We all had to crouch down in the bottom of the boat so we didn't hit our heads.


with likes from Phoebe

Monday, October 24, 2011

moving house...

In Barcelona most people live in apartments, so moving house is a bit tricky. You have to hire a crane to lift all your furniture up over the balcony! This is a common sight in Barcelona.




Our friend Peter is an artist who has been living in Barcelona for 5 years. He brought his piano all the way from Australia and it had to be lifted up over the whole building and down into the courtyard. I had a go at playing it.

Thursday, October 20, 2011

Run rabbit run, rabbit run run run

Today we went to the market and bought a rabbit for dinner. The butcher cut it up for us with her big cleaver.  She was also selling lots of other things I have never tried before like brains. She thought Leo was very cute but we didn't let her hold him.



 Dad cooked it in a typical Catalan way - CONEJO con jerez  y chocolate (RABBIT with sherry and chocolate).You can't really taste the chocolate but it makes the sauce a bit richer.


I had mine with some pasta. It tasted a bit like chicken but with lots of bones.


After dinner I felt inspired to make bunny shadow puppets.

Sunday, October 16, 2011

Ma ma ma my Girona!

This week we went to Girona where we spent two days and a night in a hotel in the medieval part of the city. Girona is famous for its Romanesque and Gothic buildings, and the Roman wall that still surrounds parts of the city. You can walk on parts of the wall. It is a Catalan city, and a lot of people go to university here. 

This also means they mostly speak Catalan, which is the language of Catalunya (where Barcelona is) but it is very different to Spanish. It is quite hard to understand sometimes, but everyone understands 'muchos gracias' (thank you very much) so I make sure I say this a lot. X in Catalan is pronounced 'sh'.


It took us an hour and a half on the train. We packed some lunch and I listened to music on the way. My favourite song at the moment is Somebody that I used to know by Gotye.


A river runs through Girona, dividing the old and new cities.  The river is full of big fat carp we watched swimming.


The medieval town is high up on a big hill. We climbed up many steps to get there.


This is outside the cathedral, looking down onto the square. Dad doesn't like being up high and he didn't like my sister and I standing too close to the edge.


This is a new stained glass window in the big cathedral finished only in August this year. It is by the famous abstract painter Sean Scully. Mum could see his signature on the bottom right of the window.


We went into the cloisters of the cathedral and threw some money into the pond to make a wish. Mum explained that all of the marble columns were carved by hand.


All of the narrow streets in this part of Girona have beautiful stone mosaic patterns. They can be hard to walk on.



We also visited the Banys Arabs (the Arab bathhouse). It is the only public bathhouse discovered in Medieval Spain, although it is not used anymore. It has a frigidarium (cold room) and a tepidarium (warm room).


We had dinner in a Catalan restaurant, but my sister and I found pizza on the menu. All the tables and chairs in the restaurant were on different steps going up this hill, leading to the convent.

Saturday, October 15, 2011

desayuno (breakfast)



This is an ensaimada from the bakery downstairs. It is a Mallorcan breakfast pastry. It is a little bit like a croissant in a coil shape but with an orange flavour.


Every day we have this. The Catalan spelling of 'honey' reminds me of my lovely prep teacher!

Barcelona Zoo

Barcelona Zoo is most famous for Snowflake the albino gorilla who came to the zoo in 1966. He's been dead for almost ten years but there are still Snowflake postcards, posters etc all over Barcelona and now there's a new animated film devoted to him. 

It was exciting to see so many of the world's most exotic creatures assembled all in one place even if that place is very small and the locals ignore 'do not feed the animals' signs. 

I liked the chimpanzees the most because they were so funny. They were fighting and playing a lot.



this monkey was the cutest..


We have a rug just like this


Time to run!





Another sleepy leo...

Leo loved the zoo

 We brought sketch books and pencils so we could draw the animals


Olympia draws an elephant


Here it is...



Here is my giraffe drawing.

Wednesday, October 12, 2011

Barceloneta

It has been very hot so we have been swimming locally at Barceloneta. Yesterday we caught a bus to the beach, which was much faster and fun because we could see where we were going. Barceloneta and Port Olimpic was all redeveloped for the 1992 Olympic Games, so now it's full of restaurants and hotels.

This is a Frank Gehry sculpture that looks like a bronze fish.

This is me sitting looking at the beach.


This is a sculpture right on the beach by Rachel Whiteread.


It's a nice beach to swim at because there are almost no waves, but there are people always trying to sell things: "birra, birra, coca cola, aqua"! It is a noisy beach...

old and new friends

This is my friend Kate. When I was in Barcelona 6 years ago Kate was just about to turn 1, and I celebrated her birthday with her. She and her mum Josie, who plays viola in the philharmonic orchestra, live in the apartment above us. It has been great to see her again. We play most afternoons in the park when Kate has finished school for the day. She starts at 9am and finishes at 4.30pm. The park is always full then until at least 7pm!