Curlew Camp

In the 19^th century the Europeans fashioned the term ‘En Plein Air’ which means to venture out to live and paint. This lifestyle was embraced by Australian artists such as Frederick McCubbin, Charles Conder, Arthur Street and Tom Robin who established artists camps in Heidelberg, Victoria and on the shores of Sydney Harbour.
The most well known of these artists camps was set up in Little Sirius Cove and became known as the Curlew Artists Camp. Access to this camp was difficult for the artists who had to negotate rocky cliffs overgrown with bracken to get down to the Cove. Today the walk is easier with the newly installed boardwalks, new pathways and information boards defining the history of the camp.
The walk is tranquil and steep. If you have a baby like ours best to carry them down in a baby pouch. It was beautiful sitting down on the rocks looking out to the bushland where Tom Roberts famous 1894 work of ‘Mosman Bay’ was painted though Id imagine it would of been better than the suburbia we are looking at today. We find the rock where he scrawled Curlew Camp, 1880 and read that he set up residence
So come experience the ‘En Plein Air’ right here in Mosman though you might not be able to set up camp here its nice to learn a little bit of heritage of Little Sirius Cove.