Ugo Catani's A Summer Shower in Collins Street, 1889, sets the scene for Andrew May's invitation to walk the streets of Melbourne, imagine the everyday past, and see the urban landscape with new eyes.
For the author, as for artists like Catani and Tom Roberts, the street frames the ever-changing throng of the wealthy and down-and-out, the passers-by, shoppers, idlers, hawkers, cabbies, entertainers, beggars, larrikins, prostitutes, custodians...