I live in one of the earliest settlements in Australia, the Hawkesbury River region. Governor Lachlan Macquarie was Sydney's first Governor, ordering and supervising the creation of buildings such as the first Barracks stables which still stands as the Sydney Conservatorium of Music. The Hawkesbury Regional Gallery's current Exhibition commemorates his BiCentennary.
For the past three months every spare minute (few though they seem to be!) has been spent actually IN this drawing! I feel as though I have been wandering the stables behind the Domain, hearing the shouts of men as they saddle their horses before riding the dirt roads of Sydney town 1810, and seeing the horrific conditions the early convicts who built this city had to endure. I know the heat and dust and flies.. I smell the incredible sea salt air of Sydney Harbour on a Spring day and hear those sea birds wheel and soar high in our beautiful cerulean sky.. Those horses who were shipped across the ocean to live here (months spent sailing away from the cool green of England) surely deserve a memorial to their struggle to adapt to this land, to temperatures soaring above 40 degrees Celsius (100F).
I drew an Arabian mare as tribute to the Endurance horses who now bring fame to the Sydney through to Hunter region, with the lower Blue Mountains being some of the best Endurance country in the World!
Private Collection.
Jenny! This turned out so beautiful and inspiring -- I feel a sense of time and history and the gentle love of the horses. Big hugs my friend - you outdid yourself with this one.
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