thake

Life in The Present alerted me to this stunning online SLV exhibition Who was Eric Thake
boynton knew of this image, but little else, and has enjoyed exploring this site
Especially this wonderful map in the Melbourne memories section.

For Eric Thake, the 'day before yesterday' was not an exercise in sterile nostalgia, but always an act of affectionate re-creation. This is nowhere more evident than in the map he made of the Melbourne suburban neighbourhood in which he grew up in the 1920s and 30s. Then known as Auburn, and today as Hawthorn, it was still a place where cows grazed.

Cherished memories pursue each other in and out of the snakes-and-ladders grid of suburban streets

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Comments: thake

I liked this: "when Thake was interviewed late in life, he was asked if he might have been more prolific without the constraint of a full-time job. With a typically ironic deflection, he replied, 'I might have done more: I might have mowed the lawn more'."

What honesty!
Posted by wen at December 30, 2003 09:52 PM

parkinson's law of the jungle (or garden) I guess.
Posted by boynton at December 30, 2003 10:03 PM

Fascinating stuff on Thake, thanks. Let's hope the word spreads. And thanks for your diverse posts over the course of the year.
Posted by murray smith at December 31, 2003 05:27 PM

cheers.
Thake sure was a find for me.
Then coincidentally last night I was reading an old dry Council history of this suburb when I came across the name of Eric Thake as being one of the municipality's artists. He lived a few blocks away from where I'm sitting.

Happy New Year.
Posted by boynton at December 31, 2003 06:36 PM