The Australian War Memorial has responded with courteous indignation to Tuesday's column. We voiced agnostic suspicions that the memorial's estimation of a 128,000 congregation at the Anzac Day Dawn Service was a vast, sentimental exaggeration.
Subscribe now for unlimited access.
$0/
(min cost $0)
or signup to continue reading
But a memorial staffer has contacted us to fume, courteously, that the estimation was not a figment of any fevered pro Anzac Day imaginings of director Dr Brendan Nelson. Rather, staff gave him a figure to proclaim, one they stand by, arrived at using what the memorial thinks is a reliable crowd-counting "methodology".
The memorial has sent us details of how it says it does its Dawn Service congregation sums. The indignant (but courteous) memorial staffer has told us how "disappointed" and "surprised" he is that we didn't ask for details of this before tangoing into print. This columnist, who hates to disappoint and surprise, hadn't dreamt that there was such a methodology to ask about. My routine, annual disagreements with the memorial's fulsome-sounding calculations of Dawn Service congregations I've been among (usually at least double my own calculations) have never previously raised a peep from the memorial.
The same memorial staffer says that the calculation of 128,000 seems to be supported by last weekend's teeming occupation of Canberra hotels and by ACTION's well-reported serious underestimation of how many charabancs it would need.
Our scepticism about all this is still alive, and we don't think that the profundity and importance of the Dawn Service has anything to do with how many attend it. But the memorial's response has sewn a seed of self-doubt in our always doubt-tortured mind. Readers' opinions on this are keenly sought, especially if you were at Saturday's service, are au fait with a packed MCG, and have an opinion on the sizes of those respective congregations.
Meanwhile, the arithmetic being so easy, everyone agrees on the calculation that there is just one Powerful Owl at Turner. Sometimes affectionately called the "Powl" it is haunting the neighbourhood of the RUC bowling club.
The famous owl, much-discussed in this column, has inspired lots of fine photography and some poetry (published here) and was always bound to inspire other artists of all kinds. We can neither confirm not deny that there is an opera being composed about it, but we do know that the owl's feathers have been an inspiration to painter Meg Morton.
Her forthcoming exhibition Of Birds at the breathtakingly avant garde Nishi Gallery contains exquisite watercolour paintings of the feathers of native birds. She's been collecting and then portraying the "fallen feathers" she's found for two years now, for this, her second show.
"I've collected the majority of feathers right here in Canberra," she explains, "some from Namadgi National Park and across wider NSW."
No powerful owls were alarmed in the collection of the species' feathers. Fallen feathers, they were collected from beneath one of its favourite roosting trees in Turner.
We don't need to tell this column's bird-conscious clientele that birds' feathers are, being literally feather-light but still so sturdy, wondrous things. This species' feathers take on a special glamour, belonging as they do to a spectacular, possum-butchering beast with a wing span of up to 140cms. But Morton has chosen to paint, rather than the biggest, boldest feathers of this Leviathan, some dainty downy ones. These are literally the poster feathers of the forthcoming show.*
The owl, though half-expected to fly away soon, is still there and is still getting excited mentions in the Canberra Ornithologists Group's trill room (like a chat room but for ornithologists).
"I got to see the Powerful Owl this morning at about 10am, perched in a pine tree," someone trilled on Sunday.
"Was lovely to watch it preen around its impressive yellow feet."
And while with our feathered citizens, loyal readers will know that a recent theme of this stridently feminist column has been the need for artists portray not just male Gang-gang cockatoos but females as well.
New Gang-gang artworks being installed in the road/pavement of the new Bunda Street "shareway" so far barely give the subtly beautiful females a guernsey. Instead there is a plumageist (our word, of which we're rather smart-arsedly proud) emphasis on the foppish males with their crimson heads.
Noticing our discussion, artist Rod Usback sends us this painting (a scoop for us, since it is yet to be exhibited anywhere) of a male and female Gang-gang juxtaposed with a famous local waterfall. It was intended for a looming exhibition (since postponed) organised by the Ginninderra Falls Association.
"I thought you would be interested," he muses, "in what might be a helpful follow up to your disappointment at the absence of the 'fairer sex' Gang-gangs in the Bunda Street paintings."
"I haven't titled mine yet, but will name it something like Breakfast at Ginninderra Falls."
He thinks the Ginninderra Falls connection is noteworthy, in light of the recent announcement that the NSW government has given Yass Valley Council the go-ahead to join with the ACT government in thinking of a possible cross-border suburb at Parkwood.
He thinks "It will be important to keep nature and the environmental values of the Falls area to the fore in such development."
*Of Birds - a study of native bird feathers, opens at the Nishi Gallery, 17 Kendall Lane, New Acton (a very short glide, for an owl, from the Palace Cinemas) on Friday 8 May. It continues until Sunday 17 May.
