4 January 2020
OMG isn’t this amazing ? I thought this was both beautiful and bizarre – a costume representing electricity (see the pylon headdress ?) worn by Jessie Clarke (nee’ Brookes) at the Pageant of Nations held at the Melb Town Hall as part of the celebrations for the #CentenaryOfVictoria. It’s at the @state_library_victoria exhibition Velvet Iron Ashes, about a third of it devoted to the #StateElectrictyCommission. A great photo of #Yallourn Power Station, a snap of the town of Yallourn being demolished in the 80s to make way more coal mine, a poster promoting an arty protest against the demolition featuring ‘Burnie Briquettes’, an outfit made from briquette bags for the show (I think), and ! And a lump of coal. So much #carbonpollution, our #browncoal emits more carbon than black coal for the same energy produced ☹️
Update : a bit more research- the headdress is in fact a reproduction for the exhibition (the original was destroyed on Ash Wednesday), and the whole thing represented Victoria; lines on the cloak represented irrigation, and the dress is painted with scenes of Melbourne. The costume was designed by young Thelma Thomas, who went on to quite a career in the theater. This outfit was in fact the centrepiece of the event, which was in part to promote the League of Nations, and an idea by Jessie’s mother Ivy Brookes (née Deakin), and both were activists in various ways.
Storey of Melbourne 