A quick visit to melbourne to see both end of the cultural spectrum, Saturday at the Ian Potter gallery at fed Square, Sunday at the Melbourne Motor Show.

Two hours is about as much as anybody can handle in an exhibition before one’s head becomes so full that either priorly stored information (eg, spouses birthdays, etc) start dropping off the cliffs of grey matter or alternately, ones cranium physically explodes.

And surprisingly prolific von Guérard’s body of work was. The most impressive 21st century addition to gallery viewing was the electronic folio where one could virtually flip through the artist’s various sketch books. His Lake Gnotuk (a personal favourite) which usually abides in Ballarat Gallery was on show, but strangely named something completely different (lakes or ponds or something).

Documentary art such as this always depresses me as the landscape was portrayed as it was. 160 years of of rabbits, dogs, cats, cane toads, Mexican mosquito fish & feather grass, lantana, brumbys, cows, goats, foxes, capeweed, willow, Indian Mynah birds, rats, mice & deforestation later, one could only marvel (and weep) at the natural pre-colonial ecological landscape.