This week's Illustration Friday topic is house, and it just so happens that in last couple of months I have illustrated some houses. And very different these houses are, even though they both can be seen to be typical of their neighbourhoods!
Firstly is a sketch of a Queenslander house, very common in Rockhampton where I used to live. Rocky is built right on the Tropic of Capricorn, and so the older housing is built to be cool in a hot and humid before the common use of air-conditioning. There is a lot of ventilation which stops heat build up in the house and allows flow through of breezes. Also they are built off the ground for a bit more cooling; an added benefit of this is that house built in flood prone areas, such as the lower lying parts of town, can cope pretty well with a couple of metres of muddy flood water.
Weatherboards and corrugated iron are the main building materials used. I lived in a house such as this when the major cyclone Marcia came through town, and though it rattled a creaked a lot it came through unscathed.
In January I went to Tasmania to participate in the annual 'Faith and the Arts' summer school, and I did this painting of the brick workers cottages in the shadow of the Western Tiers. Poatina is an old Hydro village, and was built in the late 50's to house the workers constructing the Hydroelectric power-station from the Great Lake up on the plateau above the town. A huge tunnel was bored through the rock and a pipeline came down the mountainside to the power station at the bottom. Poatina was to service this, but with automation, the town was virtually abandoned until taken over by Youth Work organisation Fusion Australia in 1995.
There is now an arts colony in the town, with artists of all sorts staying and passing through all the time. The arts centre features kilns for glass works of all kinds.
The housing is mid century brick veneer workers cottages, which don't have to cope with prolonged heat and humidity, but icy winds and occasional snow is a real possibility.
