Australia Part 1

I was asked by Semi-Permanent to come out and give a talk in Melbourne. I'd never been to Australia before, and was super excited. The flight over the Pacific was long, but I read a book (Sidhartha), read a couple magazines, slept, listened to some podcasts, wrote a little and before I knew it I was in OZ. My pal Martin McIntosh picked me up from the airport- very much appreciated after such a long flight!By the way, that Hulk Hogan poster was in an alley, apparently those guys are coming to Oz too!

My room was nice. They put up the speakers at the Urban Hotel in St. Kilda. Good lighting, which I put to good use later when I had some painting to do. The staff was cool. Do you know that people don't tip very often in Australia? When I got room service they would never accept my tips.

This was my view out the window. It was raining when I got there. After that initial rain it was clear until the last day.

The day cleared up, so I went for an afternoon walk after I took a nap. My hotel was right near the beach, but it was cold, very cold! Got some good and warm soup at the end of the St. Kilda pier.

Martin knew of my candy obsession so he got me a gift bag of sweets. Mmmm Pollywaffle's are nice. Looked like a huge turd at first, I hesitantly bit into it and was rewarded with sweet wafflecone and marshmallow heaven.

Australian money is cool too. I commented to someone that it's interesting that all the bills are different sizes, and they asked how blind people in the US can tell if they're getting ripped off. Hmmm, I don't know.

Gemma at Outre Gallery. Martin in the back. I met a lot of nice people in Australia.

Martin took me to a place called Cookie for lunch. Good and spicy! Martin hooked it up!


There is a graffiti alley out there called Hosier Lane. I was supposed to paint something in there but never found the time.

The organizer of Hosier Lane, Andy Mac, has a gallery called Until Never. They had a really cool show of James Callahan's screen prints. I think this was a collab with several artists, one of the coolest things I've seen in a while. Really made me wnt to do some prints and explore screenprinting..

This is the hub of Melbourne, Flinders Station. Kinda looks like Lego blocks to me.

Tara McPherson was also there to talk, throwing some gangsta signs with fans.

This was damn good. Chicken wrapped in bacon with a rice globe. Mmmm.


Stay tuned for part two...
Jeff