RELATIVITY!

Yes! the internet makes the world a smaller and much more accessible place that's the truth.
Sure it's that concept which breathed life into my own blog, The Lilliputian, a photographic blog for the small world.
It's only when I stepped outside my hall door in Dublin and put one foot after the other that the scale of the world re-established itself in my head.
I have been away for over 8 weeks now and I have visited so many fantastic people in so many cities.
It took 23 hours to shoot us across the world to the Immigration Museum in Melbourne. Once arrived there Jet Lag and the hard work of winding up publicity to the opening of the "Leaving Dublin" exhibition immediatly took its toll and wiped out the first 12 days of the journey. (But what a 12 days!!)
It was only a week and a half into the trip that I started to wake up as I prepared to travel off to visit some of my sitters who had settled in Australia and New Zealand.

Heres how it went!
From Melbourne I departed for Sydney (with Carole, Niamh and Gráinne) my purpose to make a follow on shot with Lynn Murphy and Trish O Gorman and Stephen Gill.
All went well there and we had a blast with a great view of the city and a great location beside the bots in Wooloomooloo.
From there we took a train to Lawson in the Blue Mountains Carole and Gráinne stayed there for a few days and I got the train back to Sydney and made the cross continental flight to Perth to make more work with Elaine Bannon, Paul Moloney and Darren Crook.
Darren had relocated to the fantastic town of Freemantle and I spent most of my time there waiting to meet with him but this never happened. Paul and Elaine made the rest of this trip easy for me with
Elaine providing a couch-bed in her lovely east Perth home.
Whilst there I visited Freemantle Prison with Elaine to remind myself of the true nature of Australia's horrible birth under the tyranny of its founders. I was delighted to hear once more the tale of the only escape from the gaol, but thats another story!
On return from Perth I picked up a car at Sydney Airport just in time for rush hour traffic, after a redeye flight, and of course I started by taking the rental car from domestic airport car rental pick up to international rental returns in ten minutes!!
Thanks to the helpful crews I encountered here I was on my way to Lawson in no time and managed to stay awake till I arrived.
The next day a real adventure began as myself Carole and Gráinne set off on a mini road trip from Sydney to Brisbane.
We stopped 3 times alone the way, Taree, Coffs Harbour and Ocean Shores.
Ocean Shores was so good we chilled there for a week and a half swimming everyday, watching the surfers and the subtropical wildlife and rugged landscape of Byron Shire.
Whilst there we all met with another sitter Alan Pentony and shot a roll of tmax!
From there we tripped to Brisbane and there we met with Louise and George Haslett and their children Ella and Ewan. I took a one day crazy trip to the city of Rockhampton further north to meet with Rae and Clay two fantastic people who settled in a beautiful Queenslander home in a city surrounded by nature, it's all heat, trees, fire and floods here and beautiful to boot.
Clay made me very welcome and showed me around the town, mountains and the subtropical Botanical Gardens. We watched a little cricket and later when Rae returned from work we shot a roll or two and I headed off to catch my plane. A perfect day (4.30am till 10 pm)
From there we jetted off to New Zealand and what a trip.
We arrived in Christchurch a city devastated last year by a terrible Earthquake which had 250 fatalities
and a whole lot of buildings wiped out. The resilience and fortitude of its people is an example to us all as the city plans to rebuild now that aftershocks have ceased.
Here we stayed a couple of nights with Linda dePaor and her husband Philip Duggan and sons Luca and Ely
Whilst In New Zealand I photographed Linda and co. and Eamon Hegarty on the other end of the Island in Auckland.
From there we returned to Melbourne to see how all was going, and to make new images of 2 more sitters, Conor Savage and Sinéad Hegarty.
All the time I travelled with my photo kit, making pictures as I moved around, there are many days and nights film and file processing ahead of me. I cant wait to see how all  has works out.
Most of the instant digital stuff is already up on the internet on my travel page one foot  then  another. Enjoy it all, there will be more to share in the weeks and months to come.
At the top of this page is the biggest joy of my photographic life so far.
That is the 2 giant graphics from the front of the Immigration Museum as seen from the inside of the first floor windows. Not how they where meant to be seen. But, for me they say so much about the spirit of the work and its relative scale when put beside the historical and the heritage bricks, mortar and fine plasterwork!! From thought through to conception and on to the world which moulds and reshapes the work for its own purpose this perhaps will be the nicest accident my work will encounter.
Once more big thanks to all who helped put this work up on the world stage especially my Dublin cohorts, Artur, Hugh, Ray, Ian, Chris and all who turned up on those cold dark nights to lend a hand.
As always comments are appreciated, anticipated and answered!
Big Thanks!
David