Tour of Star Wars Identities Museum Exhibit

We continue to battle high temperatures. This weekend on Saturday it was 106°F and while the temperature has come down some, it’s still in the 90's with high humidity. Pray we break the cycle! On 27 December, we were given complementary tickets to go see an exhibit of Star Wars memorabilia from the various movies entitled "Star Wars Identities" at Sydney's Power House Museum. It was a clever exhibit that gave you an electronic wristband that you passed over 10 different stations in the show. The point being to educate participants about how people‘s choices (and other things that people have no choice over) affects their identity. At the end you get to name your character and then, based on your choices, it gives you a little biography. Interesting and fun. This first image is of the five of us at the entrance to the exhibit. Look carefully at the image of Yoda in the mural and you’ll see how it is made up of a scene from Yoda’s home planet. From left to right (photo 1) Br. Bernard, myself, Fr. Gerard, Br. Dominic, and Fr. David. Here (2) I’m modeling one of my Christmas presents that my sister made for me: a backpack from a material with Star Wars characters all over it. I wasn’t quite sure how to pose and still show the backpack! She is so talented and such a wonderful sister! I am fascinated by how illustrations become three dimensional props in a movie. Here are drawings (3, 4) of creatures used in the original Star Wars cantina scene. The drawings themselves are works of art for any Star Wars fan! I was skeptical that they would bring actual props used in the movies all the way to Sydney. But they did! Here are some of the costumes (5-7), such as Boba Fett's, used in the various movies. I won’t go through all the characters but it’s impressive to stand there and look at costumes that were in fact used in this movie that was so powerful for me as a kid. Needless to say, it has affected my life all the way into adulthood.

The droids can be seen also all together (9-12). Images 13, 14, 15 and 16 are concept sketches done by a famous artist Ralph Macquarie. These are the images that appeared in a book I had of called The Art of Star Wars growing up. I knew the paintings well because I studied them as a kid. Images 17-20 are various studies for Jabba the Hutt, his actual eyes, and a 3-D miniature model. I also took photos of some of the "descriptions" so I won’t go through each image. You can read what you want. Description in image 21 is for 22, etc. Look at image 28. It is one of the few masks that still exist of a character from the cantina scene in the original movie in 1977. As kids we used to call him "Butt Face" but the character's real name is Ponda Baba! And they also have the actual 'slave dress" that Princess Leia (the late Carrie Fisher) wore as well as another costume that she had on the planet Hoth, the Carbonite prop of frozen Han Solo, the actual Yoda puppet, and Chewbacca‘s custom.

Perhaps most impressive was a huge gallery that had many of the models of spaceships and vehicles used in the movies (60-69). This was before computer graphics. These were the actual models in the films! Of course I got excited! Even more so seeing the Millennium Falcon (75)! Luke Skywalker was my hero growing up and so it was nice to be near costumes that actor Mark Hamill wore in the films as a rebel pilot in the original movie (93), and then as a Jedi (118) in Return of the Jedi. I was also impressed by the costume of Darth Vader at the very end of the exhibit (122-124). I was delighted by the sketches and concept drawings of things not even seen in the movies, such as Vader's castle (118). Image 125 and 126 are my character and his bio.

I know I’m a geek! And a huge Star Wars fan. If any of you are, I hope you enjoyed the show, too! (We were there for about two hours and I'd like to go back! Let me know when you're coming down for a visit!)