Albare will bring a free concert to the Olive Pink Botanic Garden, performing songs from his forthcoming album release entitled “Long Way” and his extensive back catalogue.

Long Way was recently recorded in New York, the first album to emerge from his new signing to prestigious German recording label Enja. Some of the world’s finest musicians play on Long Way and for one time only, this line up of international players will be visiting Australia to play.

The show line up includes:

-         Triple Grammy Award winning drummer Antonio Sanchez

-         Saxophonist George Garzone, a member of the Grammy winning Joe Lovano Nonet

-         Leo Genovese, the avant-garde pianist who has toured with Grammy winner Esperanza Spalding;

-         Hendrick Muerkens, the most important jazz harmonica player since Toots Thieleman;

-         and Albare’s musical collaborator, bassist and composer, Evri Evripidou, whose inventive and electrifying use of six and seven string basses and a variety of electronic effects takes bass playing to the extreme.

Don’t miss this one off global event, featuring some of the world’s finest jazz musicians to ever share a stage in this country, all on the one evening. It is unlikely to be repeated!

Produced by Matthias Winckelmann, the new album Long Way, will be released thru Enja locally on April 20th.

Visit albare.info for more information

THURSDAY, 7TH JUNE

Olive Pink Botanic Garden, Tuncks Road, Alice Springs

3.30pm

Free entry

Enquiries:  (08) 8952 2154 / www.albare.info

‘ Look Up, Look Down.’  an exhibition by Barbara Stuart – Olive Pink Botanic Gardens – August 10th – 26th 2012

This new body of work has mainly been inspired by the transformation of the desert by the rains beginning in 2009. Not expecting another year of rain Morris and I took a flight from Coober Pedy to Lake Eyre in 2009 believing this event wouldn’t happen again in our lifetime.

I’ve since painted from the photos I took during that flight. The rains have continued for three more years with resulting work emerging of the country and gorges around Alice Springs. Included in the exhibition are several images depicting the night skies mixed with aboriginal and creation themes. Mediums used are oils and watercolours, the paintings ranging from small to large.

Central Australia’s premier sustainability event, desertSMART EcoFair, is on again!

This educational community event engages us in the social, ecological and economic challenges of living sustainably in central Australia.

And we want you to be a part of it.

The forth desertSMART EcoFair will be held at Olive Pink Botanic Gardens August 10-12. With more than 2000 people attending last year, 2012 will see the EcoFair continue to flourish.

The event is being organised to coincide with National Science Week and will be held over 3 days (August 10-12). The Friday will see the continuation our schools day, local and regional students are invited to take part in a series of hands-on sessions to facilitate learning of key local environmental and sustainability topics including geology, ecology and meteorology, water, energy, waste, built environment and food production.

The weekend program will include 2 night programs with music, food, Central Australia’s-own Environmental Q&A and Environmental Film Festival.

The  Saturday will be jam-packed with workshops, speakers, children’s activities and green business and community stalls.

If you’re interested in having a stall, conducting a workshop, discussing an environmental or sustainability-related topic and/or promoting your business’ green credentials, products or services – then this is the event for you.

Please fill in the application forms here.

Please note: Stall fees have been added this year to assist us in making the event financially sustainable. If you are interested in running a workshop or presenting on your project, campaign, organisation or business -  we will waive the fees. Please fill in and return both forms together in this case. If not, just fill in and return the Stall Holder form – we’ll sort out stall fees closer to the date.

Thank you. We look forward to your participation.

If you have any queries, please don’t hesitate to contact either Ben or Jimmy.

Cheers,

Jimmy Cocking
Arid Lands Environment Centre
(08)8952 2497
info@alec.org.au

Ben Convery
Olive Pink Botanic Garden
(08) 8952 2154
garden@opbg.com.au

OPBG Living Collections Policy

OPBG Cultural Collections Policy

OPBG Library-Procedures Manual

OPBG Exhibition guidelines for applicants

A review of Alice Springs Botanic Gardens, Dr Robert Boden

OPBG 2008/09 Audited financial statements

Olive Pink Botanic Garden was opened to the public in 1985, and there are now over 450 Central Australian plant taxa represented in the Garden – 145 of these occur naturally within bushland on two rocky hills – and there are around 30 rare or threatened species in the collection (these are designated by 2 horizontal lines on their plant labels).

A network of walking trails takes visitors around the plant collection and up onto Annie Myers Hill, where great views of Alice Springs, the Todd River, and the West MacDonnell Ranges can be gained. There are five self-guided walks around the Garden, and the interpretive signage has been designed to help visitors understand more about desert plants and their uses, as well as learning about the life of the Garden’s founder, Miss Pink.

OPBG Species List 2012

Miss Olive Muriel Pink was an extraordinary individual – she contributed to the development of the field of anthropology, campaigned vigorously for the rights of Aboriginal Australians long before it was fashionable to do so, was an accomplished artist, and was the visionary force behind the development of the first Arid Zone Botanic Garden in the southern hemisphere.

Miss Pink did not arrive in Alice Springs until she was well in to her forties, arriving first in 1930 on an extended sketching holiday in which she travelled on the Ghan railcar and stopped off at various railway sidings where she set up camp to sketch wildflowers. The University of Tasmania has an excellent website that showcases a significant collection of Miss Pink’s wildflower sketches, some of which Olive Pink Botanic Garden used in an exhibition of Miss Pink’s Central Australian wildflower sketches held March 17th -31st 2007.

Over the next decade Miss Pink visited Central Australia several times, living variously on the outskirts of Alice Springs or in the Tanami Desert where she undertook some of the significant early anthropological studies of Arrernte and Warlpiri people. She published some of her research in well-respected anthropological journals, but she never formally completed her academic thesis due to a combination of ill health during her fieldwork, competition for the same Aboriginal informants with more established anthropologists, and withdrawal of university support for her research.

From 1942-1946 Miss Pink lived with Warlpiri people at Thompson’s Rockhole in the Tanami Desert, where she attempted to set up a ‘secular sanctuary’ for Warlpiri – a campaign that engaged her considerable lobbying skills and consumed a significant amount of her time over the rest of her life. Returning to Alice Springs in 1946, she purchased a decommissioned army hut on Gregory Terrace and lived there for the next decade, surviving on a meagre income obtained from selling flowers and fruit that she grew, and from her part-time job cleaning the courthouse.

In October 1956, at the age of 72, she set up her tent on the grounds of what is now Olive Pink Botanic Garden and lobbied NT politicians vigorously to establish a Flora Reserve on the site in order to protect native flora and provide a site where locals could visit and learn about desert environments. The Arid Regions Native Flora Reserve was gazetted in 1956, and Miss Pink was appointed as Honorary Curator, a role she maintained until her death on 6th July 1975.

Miss Pink’s hut was rebuilt within the Reserve on the site now occupied by the Visitor Centre, and she moved into this slightly more comfortable accommodation in 1958. Many of the letters she wrote over the next 20 years were addressed form “Home Hut” and there are many stories of favoured locals or dignitaries who were invited to afternoon tea with Miss Pink at Home Hut. The fare was often tea or lime juice cordial with madeira cake – a tradition retained in the ritual celebration for Miss Pink’s birthday at the Garden each year.

During her time at the Garden, Miss Pink and her Warlpiri gardener of many years, Johnny Jampijinpa Yannarilyi, planted various local native trees and shrubs as well as an eclectic collection of garden flowers, agaves and other introduced plants on her quarter acre block around her hut. One of Miss Pink’s favourite plants seems to have been the Sturt Bean Tree (or Batswing Coral Tree: Erythrina vespertilio) and she planted over 30 of these trees from seed she collected from Aileron Station in the 1960s. In her diary notes she recorded names of various dignitaries against individual trees, and at least two of these named trees still survive in the Garden today (despite the fact that this species is very frost sensitive and not very well suited to our cold winters).

An excellent biography of Miss Pink has been written by Professor Julie Marcus. Entitled The indomitable Miss Pink – a life in anthropology the biography covers Miss Pink’s life in Central Australia in particular detail. The following information provides a summary of Miss Pink’s life – particularly her work and life in Central Australia. Born in 1884 in Hobart, Olive Muriel Pink developed a love of nature early in life and went on to study art first in Hobart Technical College, and later when her family moved to Sydney studied art in Julian Ashton’s School of Art.

 Olive Pink Botanic Garden and Pop Cinema Present 

21^st FLICKERFEST International Short Film Festival presented by ING DIRECT

Celebrating 21 years of short film excellence Flickerfest Australia’s leading short film festival will be presenting another award winning programme of the best of Australia’s and the worlds short films. Flickerfest remains Australia’s only Academy® Accredited and BAFTA recognised short film festival ensuring that we continue to present an A-list class short film competition recognised amongst the best in the world.

A record 2200 entries were received for Flickerfest 2012, and a selection of the top 100 shorts were selected in official competition, all handpicked to represent the most innovative, creative and cutting edge short films being produced in the world today. This impressive and unprecedented number of contenders from all round the world confirmsFLICKERFEST’s reputation as Australia’s largest and most respected short film competition.

We will be screening an entertaining, inspiring and award winning range of highlights many of which are world or Australian premieres, giving local Flickerfest audiences the first look at the hottest short films in the world today. For many films,

Olive Pink Botanic Garden has an extensive network of walking trails to stroll around and take in the diversity of our unique Central Australian flora. There are three self-guided walks and two information brochures available for download to gain an incite into the Gardens flora, ecology and  history.

• Mallee Walk
• Wattle Walk
• Hill Walk
• Medicinal and Bushfood Plants
• Miss Pink’s Garden