Watermelon skiing to dunny derbies: Liang’s great Aussie adventure

With feet planted in watermelon boots, contestants cling to a rope towing them along a pulp-splattered tarp at the biennial Chinchilla Melon Festival on Queensland’s Western Downs.  

The quirky chaos of watermelon skiing is one of the many Queensland festival traditions Chinese photojournalist Tyr Liang has captured on camera while crisscrossing his adopted country over the past 5 years. A joyous photo of a watermelon skier taking a tumble at Chinchilla features in State Library’s newly released Highlights 2023 publication. 

An Adelaide-based scuba diving instructor with a background in maritime archaeology, Tyr paused his Master's degree studies in 2021 to focus on a huge project documenting contemporary Australian cultural events for future generations.  

‘On my list, there are about 1,000 festivals selected out of 7,000-ish events. I have gone through about 600 of them – yes, it's like 5 years of non-stop festivals. But for some of them, I need to revisit with a better understanding. 

Tyr’s photographs are archived in memory institutions such as State Library of Queensland, which holds a digital collection of his photos of the Laura Quinkan Indigenous Dance Festival, Birdsville's Big Red Bash and Winds of Zenadth Cultural Festival.  

Photo collections from Boulia Camel Races, Port Douglas Cane Toad Race and a series of candlelight concerts in south-east Queensland are being added in 2024.  

In what he describes as ‘an archaeology of our time’, Tyr documents events that are of national or state significance, culturally unique, and have run for more than 10 years.  

 We asked him about his Queensland travels, past and future ...  

‘It’s hard to choose because there are so many unique cultural events in Queensland, especially in the Outback. My favourites in Queensland so far are Winton Outback Festival and Winds of Zenadth. 

‘There are 7 days of funny ideas packed into Winton Outback Festival ... you could find Super Mario characters throwing cow pat like discus on the street, or a group of Popeyes pulling a dunny on the showgrounds. It's impossible this festival cannot make you laugh at some points. Most importantly, this unique local cultural event with more than 50 years of history has been through generations and brings a huge economic impact to this small desert town. 

‘Teams from most of the Torres Strait Islands gather at Winds of Zenadth Cultural Festival on Thursday Island (Waiben) every second year. It's a rare opportunity to see and learn the different cultures, the best singing and dancing from these remote islands all at once.’

‘I am just back from the Cameron Corner New Year’s Eve Party. It’s the only place in the world where you can experience 3 NYE celebrations in 1 hour, because of the different time zones in Queensland, New South Wales and South Australia, and how the corner was made on the map in the 1880s.’ 

‘For my next visit to Queensland, I will be travelling to the Australia Day cockroach races in Brisbane. In the past 4 years, I was in Adelaide, Melbourne and Sydney to see different traditions of Australia Day celebrations. Now I'm looking forward to seeing the funniest one. It seems everything can have a race in Australia!’ 

Explore State Library’s collection of Queensland festival photos by Tyr Liang.