Perth Voice Interactive

THIS week’s tale from the City of Vincent Local History Centre looks at Bulwer Plaza, where an artist’s delve into the plaza’s past led to deeper exploration into the area’s far older history and connections.

BUILT in 1923, the buildings on the corner of Bulwer and Lake streets, Bulwer Plaza, with their distinctive architectural Anglo Dutch style fades, have long been a local landmark. 

Over the years, the shops have hosted a range of businesses including laundries, dressmakers, grocers, electricians, a biscuit factory and even an art gallery. 

Earlier this year, the owners commissioned Perth artist Susan Respinger to breathe new life into the grand old building with a series of colourful and distinctive murals.

“The owners of the building wanted to give it a bit of a revamp. We didn’t want to overshadow the beauty of the building, we just wanted to enhance it and breathe life into it,” Susan explains.

“It was quite a difficult shaped building to work with so the only really big open wall to add a story piece was the alley wall which is fortunately still very visible to the main road. 

“We decided it should have some reference to the history of the area. I thought about the fact that the area’s history went well past the building even existing and the building was built on land which has belonged to the Whadjuk Noongar people for at least 45,000 years.”

The highlight of Susan’s work on Bulwer Plaza is the large-scale portrait of Noongar woman and Essendon VFLW vice-captain Courtney Ugle.

“I had been following an amazing indigenous photographer, Michael Jalaru Torres’ work for a while on Instagram… which is how I came across Courtney’s photo. 

“Not only was she stunning, but as I started to look into her story I was amazed by what an incredible person she is. 

“Courtney is not only a proud Noongar woman, she is also a star footballer for Essendon, a spokesperson for domestic violence, resilience and overcoming adversity for people all over the country. 

“I was ecstatic to receive permission from both Courtney and Michael to use the photo as a reference for my piece. 

“I couldn’t have asked for a more relevant face to represent the times as conversations around the country and the world start focusing more on First Nations people’s rights, violence against women and equal pay for women in sport.

“I think the most special moment I had while painting the mural of Courtney was on Australia Day. 

“I had decided not to celebrate it; as much as I love Australia, I recognise that it’s hurtful for many people to celebrate on that day. 

“So instead I decided to continue painting my portrait of Courtney. 

“While I was painting, a few local indigenous people came to chat with me and recognised that Courtney was actually a part of their family, the Ugles. 

“They told me they were incredibly grateful for this piece existing and representing their people especially on such a controversially significant day. 

“As we spoke about it we all got a bit teary. I was so overwhelmed to be able to see the real life positive effects this piece could have on the community. 

“Hopefully I’ll have the opportunity to represent more incredible role models in the future.”

Susan’s murals on Bulwer Plaza also feature a willie wagtail, yellow orchids, gum leaves and flowers and a threatened creature called a red-tailed phascogale above the Miller and Baker bakery and cafe. The animal has a connection to Miller and Baker who buy their supplies from a local farm that is supporting habitat regeneration for this vulnerable marsupial.

For information about Susan’s work visit https://susanrespinger. com/. For more information about the history of Bulwer Plaza, visit the City of Vincent Local History Centre in person at the Vincent Library, or online at https://library. vincent.wa.gov.au/localhistory-centre. aspx

POSTAL elections are a failed experiment and it’s time to go back to in-person voting, according to veteran Stirling councillor Elizabeth Re.

Letting people mail in their ballots was originally intended to boost voter turnout but it’s been hampered by issues like ballots going missing or even being stolen and submitted with fraudulent votes. A case of stolen votes in 2021 led to the magistrate’s court invalidating the election results in Serpentine-Jarrahdale’s north ward, requiring a fresh election.

Cr Re, who’s been through five council elections now, says research now points to postal voting potentially reducing turnouts and it’s more transparent and accountable to run in-person voting. 

“The ‘total’ postal option as an election voting method became available around 2003 in WA,” Cr Re told colleagues at the August 30 council meeting. “And it was considered an option to increase voting percentage.”

But she argues across nearly 20 years it only did that “marginally”, and postal voting may now be a hindrance as people lose faith in the system.

“Due to issues which have increased over the years with regards to postal papers disappearing from letterboxes, research has shown now that people are more likely to vote if they have to go and vote at a premise, than take a postal vote ballot paper and post it.”

Cr Re’s foreshadowed a notice of motion asking council staff to weigh up the costs and benefits of sticking with the mail-in elections or switching to a system where people would have a three week window to attend an in-person voting station. 

She said postal ballots could still be sent out by request to those who need them.

Cr Re reckons it could also save the council some dough, as “the cost of postal votes is becoming a huge impact on our budget,” and she’s requested the savings be tallied. 

Councillors will vote on her motion to investigate a switch at the next meeting.

by DAVID BELL

AN ASSAULT spree at Kings Park on Saturday August 27 saw police called and a man arrested on charges of attacking three children and three adults.

The first call to police came at 10.25am and several more followed in the minutes after, all complaining of one man’s behaviour.

It’s been alleged he approached and physically assaulted three children — a 12-year-old girl, a 14-year-old-boy and a 16-year-old-girl – before allegedly stealing the boy’s phone.

The children were reportedly playing Pokemon Go, a popular app-based video game that features many rewards if players visit landmarks like Kings Park.

Two men approached the attacker and he’s alleged to have assaulted both, then assaulted another 20-year-old woman. 

The three children aren’t linked to any of the adults, and the woman wasn’t linked to the two men – the only two who knew each other in this whole fracas. 

Police charged a 38-year-old Maddington man with three counts of aggravated common assault relating to the children, three counts of common assault relating to the adults, and one count of stealing, and he’s off to Perth magistrates court.

FOLLOWING extensive consultation and several committee discussions the new City of Bayswater skate park will be named “The City of Bayswater Skate Park”.

The new park is at Wotton Reserve and is partly made up of features moved from the old skate and BMX park on the other side of the reserve, which had to be demolished to make way for Metronet upgrades.

The old one was technically called “Wotton Reserve Skate and BMX Facility” but in the many months of consulting users about the replacement, it turns out no one actually calls it that and “Baysie” or “Bayswater Skate Park” is the far more common usage. 

Council staff penned an eight page report mulling over options for the new name, researching skate parks in nine other localities and finding “the most common theme appears to be that a Skate Park is named after the area it is located”.  

They wrote that during the long consultation over the form of the skate park, most people seemed to prefer the name “Baysie Skate Park” over “Bayswater” and recommended that informal moniker.

But the members of the council’s skate advisory committee didn’t like the diminutive Baysie and recommended the full and formal “Bayswater”, and the full council agreed that given the park’s regional significance it deserved to have the name spelt in full.

The park’s on track to be finished in September, providing the weather stays manageable, but so far the dedicated workers have managed to keep building under temporary cover even during recent rains.

by DAVID BELL

THE CBD is always looking for more “activation” but it got a bit too hot to handle on Sunday August 28 when police shut down an overcrowded meet-and-greet with a social media star.

Queensland-based risqué internet model Anna Paul was at an event to launch her collection for clothing brand Stax in the Hay Street Mall. 

Fans had been staking out the store for hours and by the time the event started at noon the streets were packed and the lines were getting rowdy as accusations of queue-jumping were thrown around. 

Within mninutes police shut the event down over fears the situation could get completely out of control.

The event followed a huge turnout in Sydney and big crowds in Melbourne, where fans chased Ms Paul’s car down the street after she finally found a low-profile exit route from the event.

Afterwards Ms Paul posted a social media video apologising for not running a ticketed event that could’ve kept numbers manageable, but explained she hadn’t due to wanting to keep the event free for everyone.

TWO artists separated by a century are the nexus of a new curation “dis/possession” at the Art Gallery of WA opening this week.

German-born artist Hans Heysen’s Droving into the Light depicts a drover moving sheep down a dusty sunbathed track, and was composed across seven years from 1914 to 1921 when Australia was a young nation sold as a land of opportunity for white colonists. 

Contemporary Gooniyandi artist Mervyn Street’s work Bull Ride portrays an Aboriginal cowboy on a thrashing bull.

Thrashing

Painted across 2015 and 2016, it draws on his time as a stockman in the Kimberley in the 1960s and 1970s.

They were fondly remembered days but not easy, marked by hard work and stolen wages that are the subject of a long-running class action case led by Street.

AGWA’s curator of historical art Melissa Harpley says: “By bringing these artists’ work together we can use an understanding of the past to start conversations about issues with shared importance for today’s audiences. These include questions around national identity, land ownership and use, and our relationship to the natural world.”

The two paintings form the centrepiece of the curation and are joined by works from the gallery’s collection painted by Heysen’s contemporaries, including George Clausen, Elioth Gruner, and Henri van Raalte. They’ve been on display in the past, but are this time offset by the darker reality of Street’s work and experience.

AGWA director Colin Walker said: “Dis/possession represents the Gallery’s thinking about how we engage with the State Art Collection, one of WA’s greatest visual assets, and find ways to display it that remain responsive and relevant to the contemporary moment.”

It’s free til March 26 and there are guided tours Wednesdays at 1pm and Thursdays and Saturdays at 11am.

A DOG has been poisoned at the off-leash exercise park at Bayswater’s Riverside Gardens. Bayswater council has now increased ranger patrols in the area, and people are advised to contact the RSPCA’s cruelty hotline on 1300 278 3589 to report any information about the baiter. 

Dog owners are advised to watch for signs of poisoning including vomiting, rapid breathing, drooling, watery eyes, and loss of coordination, and to get the dog to a vet immediately.