Blue is the colour - football is not is the game

There had to be a world cup reference today, but I'm not a fan, so the reference is in song.  Every day, for the past 9 days, I have pulled back the curtains to cerulean blue skies - except for yesterday, when we met the dawn on the way to the Bold and Beautiful morning swim at Manly.  Since the air temperature was about 7 degrees C ( although I was assured that the water temperature was a balmy 17 degrees C),  I was on photography and coffee duties only.

As the sun came up, the sandstone on the walk to Shelly Beach glowed with warmth - which had not manifested itself yet in my fingers.

The scene on the beach on the return walk was full of colour, interesting shapes and shadows.

Blue has also manifested itself in a previous day's bike ride  ( my sister is very fit, luckily enough she had a great bike for me to borrow).  View from the top of the Gladesville Bridge.

and in a wonderful sunset, seen as the ferry home was leaving Circular Quay.

I am saturated with inspiration, from visits to the Art Gallery of NSW, where there seems to be a much greater representation of women artists that in comparable public  galleries in the UK.  I really enjoyed the woodcuts of Margaret Preston, the award winning portrait by Ben Quilty ( who has a show on in London until 3rd August at the Saatchi Gallery).  The paint is spread so thickly on this painting, it feels edible.

Awe-inspiring Chinese contemporary art at the White Rabbit Collection, particularly their wall of paintings, which they name the Great Wall of China.  There is a terrific review of the current show here.  Thought-provoking in the extreme.

A walk across the road to see Halo, an amazing collaboration between art, engineering and science, and Sea Mirror.

In between, inspiration everywhere, from colours at food stalls

to vending machines that seem bizarre to the British eye - flip flop emergency?  No problem.

Wonderful origami gallery at Kinokuyima books, but no photography allowed inside.  In between all of that I've been doing some sketchbooking and some stitching, but that will need to wait for another day, as we are about to go to here.