MONASH UNIVERSITY - CLAYTON

Monash University is a public university based in Melbourne, Australia. It was founded in 1958 and is the second oldest university in the State of Victoria. Monash is a member of Australia's Group of Eight and the ASAIHL. Monash enrolls approximately 45,000 undergraduate and 17,000 graduate students, making it the university with the largest student body in Australia. It also has more applicants than any university in the state of Victoria.

Monash is home to major research facilities, including the Australian Synchrotron, the Monash Science Technology Research and Innovation Precinct (STRIP), the Australian Stem Cell Centre, 100 research centres and 17 co-operative research centres. In 2011, its total revenue was over $1.5 billion, with external research income around $282 million.

The university has eight campuses, six of which are in Victoria (Clayton, Caulfield, Berwick, Peninsula, Parkville, and Gippsland), one in Malaysia, and one in South Africa. Monash also has a research and teaching centre in Prato, Italy, a graduate research school in Mumbai, India and a graduate school in Jiangsu Province, China. Since December 2011, Monash has also had a global alliance with the University of Warwick in the United Kingdom.

This post is part of the Weekend Reflections meme.

ARTHUR BOYD MURAL

Arthur Boyd is an Australian artist, born in Murrumbeena, Victoria 1920; died Melbourne 1999. This work is the "Australian Scapegoat" (1988 oil on canvas Gift of the Arthur Boyd Foundation, 1995) which is displayed at Monash University, Robert Blackwood Hall.

Arthur Boyd, AC, OBE, is one of Australia's most important modern artists. Alongside Sidney Nolan, Albert Tucker, Joy Hester and John Perceval, he was a member of a group who became known as the Angry Penguins. Their work drew upon European modernist styles, especially expressionism and surrealism, which were developed towards quintessentially Australian imagery and narratives.

"Australian Scapegoat" is a major work produced late in Boyd's career. The painting freely mixes references to classical mythology, Christian iconography and Australian history in the context of the Australian landscape. Engaging with key themes such as love, heroism, death and the futility of war, Australian Scapegoat depicts a tragic narrative of epic proportions, in a bold, expressionist style. As an expression of anti-war sentiment, and the horrors of war, the work also can be seen in relation to important works internationally, such as Francesco Goya's "Disasters of War" series and Pablo Picasso's "Guernica".

Australian scapegoat's action takes place under the stars, on a precarious strip of land, across which a series of symbolic figures play out an absurd theatre of the carnivalesque. The scapegoat of Christian parable is an innocent victim, and appears variously in Arthur Boyd's work - as crippled dog; the artist himself; or the scapegoat soldier, victim of war. Here, the Australian Scapegoat leans over water, echoing the self-examination of Narcissus. The figure might also be identified as a prototype digger, or soldier, branded on the forehead with the rising sun insignia.

The doomed scapegoat is centrally placed between Venus, the goddess of sensual pleasure, and Mars, the evil god of war. Mars is represented as a youth holding his vindictive mother, Juno, the wife of Jupiter and queen of the heavens. Throughout Australian scapegoat, Boyd's figures are at turns reverential and iconoclastic. At the left of the painting, an unnamed soldier stands tenderly behind his mother, who is an innocent victim of war, whilst the unexpectedly grotesque figure of Venus, goddess of love, violently holds aloft a dead chicken. Vulcan is depicted as a naked soldier whose head is buried in a theoretical book, the contents of which are digested and excreted as gold coins.

In his appropriation of such figures, Boyd uses myth to comment on the moral bankruptcy of war. He also asks us to reconsider colonial depictions of the Australian landscape as a romantic Arcadia. Finally, the artist represents himself as tragic witness in the guise of both cripple and clown, in the margins of the painting, armed with his crutch and paint brushes. This image of the artist as a figure of both potential creativity and futile paralysis is typical of the 'collision of opposites' Boyd sought to represent in his work. It also highlights the work as part of a highly personal and visionary expression of his experience of the world.

Opposite the painting is a round stained glass window by Lindsay Clark, designed by Leonard French – famous for his design of the ceiling of NGV’s Great Hall. 

This post is part of the Mural Monday meme,

and also part of the Blue Monday meme.

RELIGIOUS CENTRE, MONASH UNIVERSITY

The Monash Religious Centre, designed by John Mockridge of the Melbourne architectural firm Mockridge Stahle & Mitchell, was built in 1967-8 at the new Monash University. The university opened in 1961, and the Religious Centre was planned by the Christian and Jewish communities of Melbourne as a space that could be used by all religious groups. The funds were raised by the different groups and the building was then presented to the university, to dissociate it from any one religious tradition.

The Religious Centre was seen at the time as an important ecumenical exercise and part of the process of reassessment and reform within the churches, including moves towards liturgical experimentation, greater social relevance and greater interaction with other religious traditions. Mockridge Stahle & Mitchell, with John Mockridge as the principal designer, was a prominent architectural firm established in Melbourne in 1948, and was particularly well-known for its designs for school and university buildings and churches.

Mockridge chose the circular form of the building as a symbol of unity, eternity and ecumenical feeling. With the growth of a significant non-Western student population, the Centre has been increasingly used by other religious groups, particularly Muslims, Buddhists and Hindus. The building is used for Christian and Jewish services, Muslim prayers, Bible studies, Catholic confession, meetings of the religious societies, discussion groups and social gatherings, as well as joint ceremonies by representatives of the different users.

The organ, made by Ronald Sharp of Sydney, was installed in 1978 in the Large Chapel, which is also used for organ practice, choir rehearsals, concerts, weddings and funerals.

In these troubled times, worldwide, it is important to remember the ecumenical spirituality that all great religions share and that if all the faithful, whatever their faith chose to follow their religious principles, there would be little place for violence in the world.

This post is part of the Spiritual Sunday meme,

and also part of the Psalm Sunday meme.

And here is Joseph Haydn's setting of Psalm 19:1 from the Creation, sung in German: "Die Himmel erzählen die Ehre Gottes".

MONASH UNIVERSITY

Monash University is a public university based in Melbourne, Victoria. It was founded in 1958 and is the second oldest university in the state. Monash is a member of Australia's Group of Eight and the ASAIHL. Monash enrols approximately 39,000 undergraduate and 16,000 graduate students, making it the university with the largest student body in Australia. It also has more applicants than any university in the state of Victoria.

Monash is home to major research facilities, including the Australian Synchrotron, the Monash Science Technology Research and Innovation Precinct (STRIP), the Australian Stem Cell Centre, 100 research centres and 17 co-operative research centres. In 2008, Monash University attracted more than $210 million of research investment and grants from various Government bodies and external organisations.

The university has eight campuses, six of which are Victoria (Clayton, Caulfield, Berwick, Peninsula, Parkville, and Gippsland), one in Malaysia, and one in South Africa. Monash also has a research and teaching centre in Prato, Italy, a graduate research school in Mumbai, India. and is developing a graduate school in Jiangsu Province, China.

The photos below are from the main Clayton Campus (first three shots) and also from the Caulfield Campus (all the rest), where I was recently for work. We have had some wonderful Spring days lately, although the weather is still quite changeable.

This post is part of the Water World Wednesday meme,
And also part of the Outdoor Wednesday meme,
And also part of the Nature Footsteps Waters meme.

MONASH UNIVERSITY - CAULFIELD CAMPUS

This is photo from the Monash University Caulfield Campus. It is of a sculpture unveiled by the Vice Chancellor in 1996, called "Joy" by sculptor Le Thanh Nhon.