TODAY we’re continuing our look at b-side, a contemporary arts festival being held on Portland.

This stand-out sight at Portland Marina is sure to intrigue festival goers.

Portland Erratics, by Alex Hartley, is made up of a selection of migratory stones which have arrived on Portland.

Some of these rocks arrived naturally, such as the kelp holdfasts – brought to the island attached to seaweed.

Others, including the ballast from a wreck and geologists’ tracer pebbles, have been brought to the island by human activity.

Alex will be presenting the stones in two sculptural vitrines created from re-cycled glass.

Portland Erratics can be viewed daily from 10am to 6pm until September 14.

Australian artist Michael Goldberg has travelled all the way from Sydney to take part in b-side.

He has created a roving, mobile stone carving studio that will be touring Portland daily.

Ticket of Leave represents a reverse journey to that which Michael has made.

It echoes the passage of a number of convicts in the 1800s who, after labouring in Portland’s quarries, were transported to the Antipodes and granted good behaviour ‘tickets of leave’ that assured their freedom if they became responsible members of Aus-tralian society.

People will be able to find, if they look carefully, mysterious sandstone ‘postcards’ brought by Michael from Sydney and secreted in a number of spots around Portland. One is pictured below.

Each of these postcards will be inscribed with the geographic coordinates of a site in Sydney, Australia, whose colonial history resonates with the location in Portland that Michael will visit.

Festival goers can use their smartphones and Google maps to find these Sydney sites.

A QR code set into the sandstone when scanned will also take viewers to a website with further details about each place in Sydney. In a reciprocal gesture during the festival, Michael will carve a second series of postcards out of Portland limestone particular to the historic places he visits as he travels around the island in his motorhome.

See b-side. org.uk to see which sites Michael will be at on which particular days.

Finally, hear the weather play music at art installation Variable 4 at Portland Bill during the festival.

Outdoor landscape sound work Variable 4 by artists Daniel Jones and James Bulley translates weather conditions into musical patterns in real time.

Windswept Portland is sure to add its own unique sound to the artwork, which will ring out across the sea and over the island’s quarries.

There will be a special night time listening event at Variable 4 on September 13 from 8pm to 10pm. See b-side.org.uk for information on all of b-side’s artworks and where you can see them.