Worst Church, Worst Architecture
It’s not just knitting patterns or low grade graphics that pixelate on the diagonal, but also apparently churches. This Uniting Church in Railway Parade Mt Lawley didn’t realise that it had a major resolution problem until it was too late. Tell me, is this really a cross piercing the throat of a crocodile? I’m sure if a crocodile attacked, you’d be grateful of any help you could get, but aren’t there more prosaic needs that have priority to be set in bricks and mortar? I’m sure many good works are performed, but, brickie, heal thyself: Come on! The congregation will be laughing hard if I’m taken by a croc this week, and I’d be forced to say, “You got me a beauty guys.”
Mt Lawley Uniting Church, 165 Railway Parade, Mt Lawley WA 6050
The Worst of Perth 
Given 20 minutes and an up-to-date version of microsoft paint i would struggle to create a more resonant symbol of prayer and salvation from the torments of swamp creatures. but on closer inspection perhaps this is an image of a legless kangaroo adrift in a simple wooden vessel with the sail missing… a crude but poignant depiction of the struggles facing institutional religion in australia?
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I’m still getting crocodile, but I can just see kangarooo. So the head’s up near the cross intersection?
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Chicken skewers in a webber I think. Not sure of the spiritual significance.
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You were right on the mark with the knitting pattern LA. This is the Dockers’ Anchor is it not? The detail shows not a legless Kangaroo but a legless Geoff Farmer none-the-less still able to take a screamer over the back of an even more legless Ben Cousins (lo-res of course but it’s all there).
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I can see Jeff with his arms in the air, but more headless than legless. There does seem to be a wing mirror in his hand though.
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yes, that’s the head right there up near the intersection of mast and boom pitch. in it’s simplicity it really is a moving portrayal of a motionless creature out of its depth and element.
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There’s a lot of space below decks. Should have a koala wallowing in the bilges.
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Yes looks like a place of worship for old sea dogs.
The thing in the middle is actually a prawn having a nap in a hammock
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Looks to me like your prawn is about to be sauteed I’m afraid Les.
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L.A I must commend you on yet another superb Worst. I Love this blog, your pics, comments, and insight are fantastic.
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#3 Golden1 I love that you have crucifix shaped barbeque skewers yet fail to see the spiritual significance. “Why do you beholdest the mote in your brother’s eye and considerest not the satay stick in your own?”
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Oh it’s a crucifix! I just thought the cross piece was a clever device to stop you burning your fingers on the heat beads in the webber.
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Does the fact that it doesn’t appear to have a roof have spiritual significance?
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The Cimbalis Junior just advised me that this is the church where they attended choir for many years. I am not sure why I didn’t recognise it except usually it was surrounded by bad drivers in large four wheel drives ignoring the oft repeated parking rules. We spent many a long Friday evening sitting in the carpark out the back and could have done with a barbequed skewer of prawn or chicken (or even the bush tucker equivalent of kangaroo, Crocodile or Jeff farmer)
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13, Hey Pachyman! This was the worst shot I could get. A wider shot would have shown a not unpleasant garden, but that’s not what this is about. I didn’t get close enough to see the roof. People parked there were staring.
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People staring is a problem with every photo I have taken – is it possible to get a fluoro orange Worst of Perth plastic vest to don when standing in the middle of the road? The web address writ large on the back would alert passers by where to go to find out what is going on.
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That would cause less staring? When you take photos a lot, then the staring doesn’t matter. Staring only lasts a second, but the image will last.
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Maybe people knowing what you are doing is a bad thing, rather than pretending to be a slightly odd tourist taking photos for their grandson.
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Well, you should try sitting in a car taking shots of the very newest post. You could say “My Grandson is inside, it’s OK”.
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A vest wouldn’t lessen the staring, simply confuse and distract the starer and make it difficult for them to recollect your face in a police line up. Also it would give WOP some much needed non-brothel seeking hits.
Anyway staring is in the eye of the beholder – they may well be innocently gazing into the middle distance.
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HI Lazyaussie
Was sent a link to you site as I’m the incumbent Rev at Mt Lawley UCA – whose great grey edifice features on your website.
Hey – I’m not offended – it’s hard to disgree!!!
It’s hard to get across we do have an image problem.
Brian
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Hey Rev. Like I say, if I get taken by a croc, you guys will have the last laugh. You want a link to the church or any activities, I’m happy to put it up.
A X.
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#21 Rev at Mt Lawley,
For some reason christian theology seems to come up quite often on this site, cocas palm crucifixes, madonna and child iconography hidden in concrete koalas, ex-Coles supermarkets converted into christian temples, I’m sure your views on these matters would be very interesting. Be sure to drop a line from time to time.
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Well it seems to me that the crucifix has triumphantly impaled an evil dolphin or somesuch. The jagged gloating smile beneath is disconcerting.
Otherwise it’s an anchor with some weed on it. However, I fail to see the nautical connection in Mt Lawley . Unless it’s a church for lost sailors who once plied the Great Lakes of Monger. Though this hardly seems likely.
Rev at Mt Lawley. Please Explain.
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i dont think this is bad at all! it is remarkably similiar to the work of julius elischer, and if you ever dare feature him in this blog, i shall smite thee. check out the yokine baptist church for similiar block work, and also the mt yokine anglican church of the holy family for similiar composition. and his mechanics workshop for relief block patterning of pistons. all of you go die.
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Ah, Elisher did El Caballo Blanco.
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ARGH! It offends my eyes!
Poor old Uniting Church – they never have had the most attractive buildings. I like to think its because they spend money on more worthy causes, but maybe its because they’re just lazy – anything is possible!
I do have a solution for our mysterious piece of brick artwork, though. It’s an attempt at the Uniting Church’s symbol – a crucifix, dove and semicircle. The cross and dove are pretty self-explanatory, but the semicircle kind of looks like a cup (the cup of Christ), a boat (plenty of fishing stories in the New Testament) or is symbolic of the fact that the church aims to be Uniting with the community, not United (which sounds a little closed off). Thus, an incomplete circle shows the work is ongoing…
Anyway, the UCA was founded in 1977, so the building was probably built after that, maybe as a new one if the local Presbyterian, Methodist or Congregationalist churches were sold or just got rid of. It sure would explain the architecture, and the prominence of the symbol.
Shame it looks like a municipal toilet block with a bad case of smallpox.
PS. I put the Church’s website as my own for the entry if anyone wants to see a smaller version of the symbol. Go on, you know you want to…
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aha! I’ve finally got it after months of staring at the bloody thing – The anchor of Sea Sheperd’s “Steve Irwin” skewering the devil’s stingray
RIP Saint Stevey
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