A sketch from The Canberra Times' design files imagines a robust and mobile Parliament House.
Parliament House was officially opened 25 years ago today and, while fossicking among ancient Canberra Times picture files for a commemorative story, we came across this visionary illustration, drawn and sent in by a Page reader. From his or her signature, he or she may have been an R. Harris.
This inspired sketch, circa 1973, was in a file of pictures relating not only to designs for a new Parliament House but also to debate about where that edifice should be plonked. At one point in 1973 there were three sites being considered: Capital Hill, Camp Hill and a lakeside position somewhere close to where the brutalist High Court of Australia looms so scarily today.
Some of the fanciful ideas for Parliament House designs that were floating around in the early 1970s looked as if they might literally be able to float, through the air, because they were a little suggestive of spaceships. Here on this page we have one of those spaceship-ish designs imagined right behind and above old Parliament House.
These intergalactic-looking follies seem to have been an inspiration (scepticism about politics and politicians is obviously another) for R. Harris' design for ''the New Parliament House'' as a gigantic flying saucer. We're given a sense of the size of the behemoth by the way it dwarfs the ant-sized human figures in front of it.
The design comes with the recommendations ''Advantages: Great mobility for use in overseas trips. Easy to repair and maintain - just use government red tape.''
The ''power sources '' include ''hot air, anti-grey matter, methane gas'' and, futuristically, ''solar energy''. The designer imagines the speed being up to ''speed of light + Mk II'' but that with ''hot air'' etc being the fuel sources, availability of them will depend on how many pollies are debating, and on the agitation-making of the subjects debated.
25th anniversary of Parliament House $5 coins issued by the Royal Australian Mint. Photo: Supplied
This columnist, a bit of a smartarse in those days (thank goodness I've matured since then), can remember during this debate suggesting another kind of mobile Parliament House, not nearly so visionary as R. Harris', in the form of an enormous circus big top tent. That kind of parliament, we reasoned, could literally move around the nation (just as a circus does), going to the people, and countering the criticism that a Parliament House at privileged Canberra kept government at arms' length from ordinary Australians.
The steps to a great building
Because of our cultural cringe, it may never have occurred to us that our Parliament House (opened 25 years ago Thursday) might in any way be vastly superior to the mother of parliaments at Westminster. But suspend your cringe. In conversation earlier this week with our Parliament's principal architect, Romaldo Giurgola, (reported elsewhere in this edition), he expressed quiet delight about the happy effectiveness of aspects of the building that most of us may never have thought about.
Shoefiti over the corner of Woolley and Badham Streets, Dickson. Photo: Supplied
For example, he expressed delight that the building is, as he'd dreamed and planned, festooned with so many fine artworks. He's full of praise for those who over the years have seen to this, collecting and displaying, much as if the Parliament is a great gallery as well as a legislature.
''This is a narrative that's very important, '' he told us, ''because the public like it.
''They always ask questions about the artworks when they visit. At Westminster [Houses of Parliament in London], you can hardly find a piece of art. The architecture is good, but there are no paintings. That Parliament is treated like an office and nothing else.''
He's delighted too with how the marble foyer and its choice of marble staircases have been, for ordinary Australians visiting their Parliament, a great success. Some of us had feared their sheer splendour might intimidate the working classes, but that hasn't happened. They ascend the stairs and then beetle off to look around.
''The foyer,'' Giurgola diagnoses, ''is a place for making decisions in which direction you want to go. And then the staircase is for the public. Rather than see immediately the elevators like you see in every office building, instead [smiling delightedly about this truth] people go up the stairs. Nobody asks for the elevator. Everybody takes the stairs,'' he rejoiced.
Coin gets edgy look
They won't work in poker machines or parking meters (where round coins rule) but the Royal Australian Mint has created the nation's first triangular coin to mark the 25th birthday of Parliament House.
The commemorative, silver, triangular $5 coin (collectors will have to pay $85 for them) are being officially launched at Parliament House on Thursday as part of the 25th anniversary celebrations of the day of the building's opening.
Triangular coins are unusual, and truly triangular ones with sharp corners - the Australian ones have rounded corners - are almost unknown, perhaps because they chew holes in pockets and purses. Yet in recent times, the Ugandan government issued a truly triangular 2000-shilling piece to commemorate, mysteriously, the life of Pythagoras.
Walking on air? Nah, it's just shoefitti
As we never tire of spruiking photographer Mel Edwards' continuously updated gallery/blog ''Nah, It's Canberra'', here is her latest clever capturing - with just the camera in her mobile phone - of Canberra quirkiness.
She posts a picture you'd swear is somewhere or something else in the world, then tells you exactly how Canberran it is.
And Wednesday's newest pic came with the bonus of the introduction of a new word, so very new that not even our newsroom's trendiest had heard it before. Edwards' caption is ''Shoefitti, near the corner of W Broadway and N 26th Avenue, Minneapolis? Nah, it[s] shoefitti over the corner of Woolley and Badham Streets, Dickson.''
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