Norman Alfred William Lindsay (born in Creswick, Victoria in 1879 as the 5th of 10 children, died 1969 at the age of 90) was a significant artist in various fields in the years following Australian Federation (1901). He painted in oils, he created etchings (and you wouldn't believe the amount of work that goes into one of those), he created watercolours as well as drawings. He also wrote some novels, and even some children's books. His style was a little from the Bohemian, a little from the Arcadian so he wasn't necessarily always popular with the more conventional parts of Australian society of the time. There were a lot of breasts involved. In the paintings, in the sculptures; many, many breasts as you will see when I have finally published all of the shots from this trip. Also quite a few cats. Those you won't see so much because we were not allowed to photograph inside his former house, now museum.

He did have some friends in influential circles, though. The publisher of the first truly national magazine, the now-defunct The Bulletin (J. F. Archibald, 1856-1919; yes, the one who gave his name to the annual Archibald Prize portrait exhibit and the Archibald Fountain in Sydney's Hyde Park) enticed Lindsay to Sydney to do illustrations for the magazine.

I use the term "Sydney" loosely. In 1912, after an extended overseas trip, he moved to the Blue Mountains to the west of Sydney. These days, even with motorways it's still a one and a half hour drive from most places in Sydney (or from Wollongong). Back in those days with horses, very few cars and lastly underpowered steam engines... let's just say that it was a hike.

After Lindsay's death in 1969, his house passed to what is now the National Trust. It is run as a museum to his life and work. We took a trip up to the Blue Mountains to visit it. (Well, the museum and a favourite restaurant for a sumptuous lunch, as well as some lookouts where we couldn't see very much because it has been raining for the better part of the last month.)

It's relatively small and sometimes you can't see all of it. In particular, as I mentioned you can't photograph inside the house. Sometimes you can see his former studio (where in fact he lived alone to get away from his wife for the later part of his life), and sometimes the etching studio. We got to see the former with a very informative guide, but the latter was closed.

However you can also see the gardens in which stand many sculptures (or as he called them, "garden ornaments") of Lindsay's. He usually made these with concrete over chicken wire. Unfortunately with time the concrete has begun to crack and break, especially with sculptures which are used as fountains. A project is underway to replace them with bronze substitutes, with the originals being shifted under cover.

That's fortunate, because recently there has been some vandalism. One of the sculptures had its finger broken off. Another was smeared with red paint. This one, which is located on the far side of what was once not so much a swimming pool, as an artificial lake and therefore quite some way away from the house, has had a shawl draped over it by a person or persons unknown. At least that is harmless, if a little strange. You do have to wonder what in the living hell goes through the minds of people who will damage irreplaceable cultural artefacts just for the hell of it.