Ben Apfelbaum

SYDNEY MARDI GRAS PARADE FULFILLS 2020 VISION

Unlike the Sydney Chinese Lunar New Year Festival, the corona virus threat did not deter a 300, 000 crowd which packed along Oxford and Flinders streets. It was estimated that the same number of people watched the event on SBS.

There were approximately 12, 600 participants and 191 floats demonstrating Mardi Gras activism in some issues as LGBTQI homelessness, transgender persecution and gay and lesbian social inequality.

The biggest cheer was for the local and rural fire fighters and those floats highlighting Climate Change.

Local groups such as the military, the Guide Dog Association snd traditional Irish dancers highlighted the degree to which all of Sydney has taken the Parade to heart.

There was even a contingent from Victoria under the banner Melbourne Marching Girls, middle aged ladies who wore hooped dresses.

The 78’s were in their usual place of honour atop an open double decker bus and the Dykes On Bikes were an overture to a parade of colour, wonderment, glitter and spectacle.

The After Party had some 12,000 revellers dancing at the Hordern Pavilion  to international superstars Dua Lipa, Kesha and Sam Smith as well as Brazilian drag diva Pavilo Vittar.

Local and international DJ’s included Midland (UK), DJ Joelby (UK), B Harris (Canada) as well as locally based Estelle Louder, Kate Munro, Whisky Houston and Cupid’s Cut and kept the music pumping.

The evening was not without controversy when anti liberal marchers tried to block the Liberal Party float but were quickly removed by police, and the After Party organisers massively oversold entry tickets to thousands who were bitterly disappointed.

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.