Ben Apfelbaum

SRI LANKAN FESTIVAL IN TUMBALONG PARK

The Sri Lankan food and culture festival was recently held at Tumbalong Park in Darling Harbour.

Sri Lanka is an island off the coast of india’s southern most state Tamil Nadu. It is about the size of Tasmania and is full of exotic animals and spectacular vistas

Lonely Planet this year voted Sri Lanka as the most desired place to visit.  It accounts for 20% of all tea consumption around the globe and it is the only place where you can see ion one day the largest land and marine mammals in the world., namely the elephant and the blue whale.

To bring Sri Lanka to life there were an array of folk dancers and food stalls which proved particularly popular.

I discovered the national street food was ‘The Hooper’, a semi circular crust with an egg yolk at its base which can be filled with any spice or delicacy that you may desire.  This food stall had an especially long queue.

It was a dull grey day but the bright colours of the Sri Lankan dancers and the scenic tourist video which played out behind them effectively lifted the gloom.

All pics by Ben Apfelbaum

 

 

 

 

 

Published by Ben Apfelbaum

My photography began when my father handed me the proverbial brownie box camera as a child. As cameras developed I went through Fujica and Olympus range finders graduating to my first single lens reflex camera, the Minolta SRT101, the latter being the greatest facilitator to my growth as a photographer. Digital photography has only added to this. I was a regular contributor to Camera Craft magazine (Australian Camera ) for over three years. During Australia’s Bicentennial year (1988) I made it a personal project to document the celebrations. This culminated in the creation of a book of my photos which was published in 1989. The book was called CELEBRATING AUSTRALIA and came with an accompanying calendar. My works have appeared in a number of publications including the coffee book entitled MY AUSTRALIA (1989), publisher Robertsbridge Severn. This book had a preface by the then Australian Prime Minister Bob Hawke. I was a co-photographer on a book entitled SYDNEY- DISCOVER THE CITY with text written by Robert Treborland. Major Mitchell Press was the publisher. Also for two years I was the photographer for calendars celebrating Sydney’s multicultural communities. The two calendars were entitled MULTICULTURAL SYDNEY. My work appeared in a group exhibition held at Sydney’s Town Hall pertaining to the diversity of life in South America to raise money for orphanages there. I have over one hundred photos stored in the New South Wales State Library archive. I had a solo exhibition held in 2007 entitled Ben’s Lens at the Sydney Jewish Museum which celebrated the vibrancy of the Sydney Jewish community. Some of these photos are on the Museum’s permanent display. I have exhibited internationally firstly at the Spruill Gallery in Atlanta Georgia, united states, and in an exhibition entitled Kosher and Co at the Jewish Museum in Berlin. Currently I am a regular contributor to J-Wire and this esteemed publication.