A Message from the Breath of Life Co-Ordinator

Last Monday (Australia Day holiday) the Breath of Life team made an executive decision to take down the remaining windmills.

Many had been destroyed by strong wind the day before and others had been vandalised, one pole was pulled from the ground and a windmill found lying in Wolfe Street.

We decided that the overall design needed to remain uniform and therefore the remaining windmills taken down. Although this does not make as much of an impact as the initial installation design, public safety was our main priority as we did not want to take the risk of any remaining windmills coming loose and harming anyone.

The installation of windmills has been well documented and a slideshow will be available at the Symposium today to highlight the project in its original state. Unfortunately we do not have the funds or the physical man power to restore the full installation, except to install a couple for February 9 children's workshops. There are plenty of images available on our flickr site and blog pages that record the installation in its former glory.

The change in the design is also documented and interpreted (in a very creative way) as seen on the blog.

Ann Hardy

Co-ordinator
Breath of Life Team

Flying Windmills Reported Over 97 Cities

NEWCASTLE - Australia - Reports of flying windmills have been flooding in to mission control on the Obelisk Hill site Newcastle Australia. There are now over 266 sightings over 97 cities worldwide, as tracked by Google Earth's aerial windmill tracking station in New Jersey.

"We are so pleased, and relieved that so many survived from their brutal attack only nights ago" Varelle Hardy, spokesperson for the Breath of Life Art Installation team said today.

A Very Happy Mrs Varelle Hardy

Breath of Life, part of the Back to the City Project was one of the installations attacked a number of nights ago by giant flying vandal sharks called 'coaliaths'. Many windmills escaped (leaving their tails floating in the wind) and have been flying over the planet ever since their hasty departure.

"Evidence has also been emerging that some of our windmills have found sanctuary in distant lands and have sprouted wind farms" said Mrs Hardy. "We are sending out a call to local children to come to the Obelisk Hill on Saturday 9th February 9-11 am to help us create more windmills that we hope to plant locally and hopefully they will germinate and grow into mature wind farms." she said.

Missing Windmills - Further Sightings

NEWCASTLE - Australia - Further reports have come in of sightings of missing windmills that mysteriously disappeared on January 25. A tourist holidaying at Cairo snapped this image of a solitary windmill flying past the Giza Pyramids. Another on board an Antarctic Exploration vessel reported a number of windmills flying in formation over this tabular ice berg that had just broken off.


"They've got to be ours" said Varelle Hardy, spokesperson for the Breath of Life art installation team. "I just can't believe they've survived, we are all overwhelmed."

This was just the tip of the iceberg as Google reports over 190 sightings from 61 cities across the world.



The reports were confirmed by the National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA) who are assisting local police in tracking the missing windmills via satellite. A NASA official said that it was established protocol that when foreign bodies, such as these windmills, entered American airspace they be tracked. "This occurred 8.45pm our time when reports started flooding in of these flying white pinwheels passing our Statue of Liberty" the official said.

Detective Auster of Operation Boreas said while this was encouraging information their enquiries are continuing. "This is great news. We hope to get to the bottom of this when our forensic detectives interview the one surviving windmill later today" he said.

Breaking News - Windmills sighted over Manhattan

NEW YORK - Flying Windmills sighted over Statue of Liberty

A set of mysterious objects commonly termed "flying windmills" were sighted by the US Weather Bureau station on Manhattan Island at 8:45 pm Sunday.

Zephyr Favonius of the Weather Bureau said that he and an assistant watched the "flying windmills" for approximately 10 minutes in the bureau theodolite, the instrument used to observe weather balloons.

They said the "objects" looked like your common variety American pinwheels, though looked different.

"They threw a soft white light", they said, "as they passed the Statue of Liberty and occasionally took on a blueish hue. They moved through the sky at a leisurely speed and finally disappeared toward the northeast".

Breaking News - Windmills Mysteriously Disappear

[REUTERS] NEWCASTLE, Australia - Dozens of white-sailed windmills have mysteriously gone missing over night from the Obelisk Hill site where they were installed only days ago, a representative for the Back to the City Arts Project said on Monday. All that remain are their tails.

The Breath of Life Art Installation team installed over 60 windmills, also known as the Australian White-Sailed Pinwheels, on the historic Obelisk site, 167 kms north of Sydney, as part of the Back to the City Project that was launched on the 25th January 2008.

"We have found a small number strewn on the ground showing evidence that some had been attacked by vandals or something quite monstrous and ferocious. You can tell by the teeth marks. The rest are missing," Varelle Hardy, a senior official of the Breath of Life installation team, said.

But she ruled out the possibility of all 60 missing windmills falling prey to the vandal monsters.

"If these vandal monsters had destroyed them they should have left behind the bodies" after taking away the sails, she said, adding that just one in tact windmill had been found during an extensive search.

"Where did they go? I have no answer. It is a mystery," Mrs Hardy said.

A Police spokesman did not rule out the possibility of contacting the Central Intelligence concerning the matter, "We will contact Interpol if necessary, in order to find out who did this. It's an outrage. In all my years of policing I have never seen such a thing." Detective Auster said. The Police confirmed today that they would set up Operation Boreas in an attempt to find the perpetrators.

"We hope that the one windmill who survived will help us with our inquiries" he said.

Sites to Behold

All in a Day

View the Breath of Life slideshow on Flickr

During the afternoon the site became alive with the vista of windmills all around, the installation formed new viewing points and the Newcastle landscape (looking outwards) seemed so much different. The scene to Nobbys Headlands was framed and the view towards the Kooragang Windmill made it not appear as isolative as usual. The nearby Jesmond House appears closer , not as detached from the hill. The Parade Ground and Military Buildings on the James Fletcher Hospital site are now in focus. Those enjoying the nearby Park, take a quick glance at the Obelisk, it has some new friends for a while. It has a 'Breath of Life'.

The City is captured from all angles.