Today we spent a lovely few hours in Sheffield (on the way to Cradle Mountain). Sheffield is the Tasmanian town of murals – there are huge murals painted on walls everywhere, it is a beautiful little town situated at the base of a big beautiful mountain called Mount Roland.
Every year Sheffield holds a national Muralfest where artists submit small scale pictures of murals to be entered in the competition, each year a new poem is released from which the artists must draw inspiration for their designs. A few of these artists are selected each year and come together for a week to paint their murals. Today was the last day of the fest and we have followed through on our tradition to go and see the murals each year.
This is the poem the murals were based on this year:
I felt your first heart beat
oh sons and daughters of mine
Like the trees of my forests
I watched you grow tall and multiply
Like a rainstorm across my mountains
I watched my daughters cry
When my sons marched to fight afar
for freedom for this land
The winds that come to embrace me
across my outstretched land
Brings new life to my sandy shores
new sons and daughters of mine
With snow covered mountains and valleys
with rivers that flow like wine
This sun covered land I give you
Oh sons and daughters of mine
You all must live in harmony
like the sea, the land, the sky.
Its much more fun going to events like these now that Oscar is a little bigger. There were clowns and bubbles and balloons for the kids to play with so he had a great time running around.
