The Mythical Australian: Barry Humphries, Gough Whitlam and "New Nationalism"

Gough Whitlam's decision in 1974 to appear in Barry Humphries's film about a larrikin abroad, Barry McKenzie Holds His Own , marks a potent moment in Australia's post-imperial history — a moment when the politics of Australian theatre and the theatre of Australian politics directly coincided. In their different spheres, Humphries and Whitlam dramatised the waning British connection felt by Australians. Whitlam's own version of "new nationalism" was brash and confident enough to embrace the eccentricities and vulgarities of Humphries's satire. Yet Whitlam's "new nationalism", like Humphries's satire, was highly ambivalent. Humphries's first film, The Adventures of Barry McKenzie , was a direct product of the new nationalist enthusiasm that had brought Whitlam to power. Although it was savaged by the critics, the film was a box-office success. Intellectuals such as Patrick White, Manning Clark and Geoffrey Dutton lavished praise on Humphries and his satirical portrayal of Australian anxieties about culture and national identity. Humphries portrayed the underlying dilemma that Whitlam faced in refashioning the image of modern Australia: how to throw off the symbols of colonialism and find meaningful symbols to replace them. In the process, both the politician and the humourist rediscovered a particular and enduring affection for the mother country.     

‘Modernist Madonnas’: Dorothy Todd,Madge Garland and Virginia Woolf

During the 1920s Vogue magazine in the UK was transformed from a society paper into a magazine of high modernism and the avant‐garde. The editor was Dorothy Todd. Todd was assisted by her protégée and lover, the Australian‐born Madge Garland. During this period Garland and Todd developed friendships with Virginia Woolf, other members of Bloomsbury, writers such as Rebecca West and artists such as Marie Laurencin. Madge Garland also developed friendships with artists, couturiers and intellectuals in both Paris and London. Dorothy Todd was sacked from Vogue in 1926 because of what was perceived by Conde Nast as its rather too bohemian direction. Todd’s career never recovered from this blow. Garland, however, went on to become a leading fashion journalist, businesswoman and textile expert. In 1947 she was appointed to the Royal College of Art, London, as the first Professor of Fashion Design. In the last stage of her career Garland wrote a number of books about art, fashion history and gardening. This article considers the lives and achievements of Dorothy Todd and Marjorie Garland, and their involvement with Virginia Woolf as her fashion advisors, editors and acquaintances. The article also examines the way in which Vogue celebrated the work of non‐Bloomsbury members and explores Marjorie Garland’s major contribution to fashion journalism, history and teaching in the UK.     

Quantitative Differentiation of Bloodstain Patterns Resulting from Gunshot and Blunt Force Impacts

Bloodstain pattern analysis (BPA) provides significant evidentiary value in crime scene interpretation and reconstruction. In this work, we develop a quantitative methodology using digital image analysis techniques to differentiate impact bloodstain patterns. The bloodstain patterns were digitally imaged and analyzed using image analysis algorithms. Our analysis of 72 unique bloodstain patterns, comprising more than 490,000 individual droplet stains, indicates that the mean drop size in a gunshot spatter pattern is at most 30% smaller than the mean drop stain size in blunt instrument patterns. In contrast, we demonstrate that the spatial distribution of the droplet stains—their density as a function of position in the pattern—significantly differs between gunshot and blunt instrument patterns, with densities as much as 400% larger for gunshot impacts. Thus, quantitative metrics involving the spatial distribution of droplet stains within a bloodstain pattern can be useful for objective differentiation between blunt instrument and gunshot bloodstain patterns.