Miss Eagle thinks of the marvellous eucalypt trunks that she has loved. She thinks, first of all, of the huge salmon pink roseate trunks of the huge eucalypts in the Cardwell Ranges between Cardwell and Mount Garnet in North Queensland. Miss Eagle thinks they may be the most magnificent trees that she has ever seen. Then she thinks of the Snappy Gum which is ubiquitous in the Outback where Miss Eagle has spent a significant part of her life. God had His decorating angels at work in deciding how brilliantly that stark white trunk and the grey green leaves went with the red soils and sands and spinifex.
Spirit of Endurance1937 Wilpena Pound, Flinders Ranges, SA.
Gelatin silver photograph (Kodura Etching Brown)28.5 x 34.1 (NLA Accession # C27-1)nla.pic-an2384497
And then Miss Eagle thought of what may be Australia's most famous trunk, most famous individual tree. This is the Spirit of Endurance, a photograph by Harold Cazneaux who is an uncle of Australia's famous expeditioner and philanthropist, Dick Smith. The tree in the photograph is in the Flinders Ranges of South Australia. Miss Eagle saw it about ten years ago. The Flinders Ranges is one of her favourite places. The tree is quite a few decades older than when it appeared in the photograph and thus has experienced even more of the vicissitudes of life. It does not look as splendid as it did then. It is a scarred tree which has survived fire. It is hardened by its experience and yet still generates life. It is an Australian parable, an Aussie metaphor.
1 comment:
Hey, you have chosen some nice trees trunks there. Photographically, the trouble with some of these things is they are so huge, you have to get way back from them. In a forest, they get blocked by other trees.
I agree entirely with your assessment of their aesthetic (you properly attribute it to Cazneaux) - but you put it beautifully in your own words: It is hardened by its experience and yet still generates life. It is an Australian parable, an Aussie metaphor.
Nicely expressed.
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