In a completely pointless move, the Prime Minister announces that a tiny, human-made mound in Lake Burley Griffin – on which the British Government’s 1963 gift of The Carillon for the 50th anniversary of Canberra is sited – would be renamed Queen Elizabeth II Island instead of Aspen Island. It seems that the bureaucrats have run out of ideas since the Golden Jubilee in 2012 as it featured similar namings of minor features in the national capital. It was the start of a very muted series of Platinum Jubilee events during 2022 which most of the population seemed to have zero interest in. At least the directional signs on a major arterial road to the airport in Canberra will remind passers-by who Australia’s Head of State is!
Woman for an Australian Republic, Adelaide Ironside, republican poet and artist 1831-1867
Self portrait 1855, Newcastle Art Gallery NSW
