Looking Gift Sculptures in the mouth

Public sculptures are often gifts exchanged between governments. It is an ancient tradition; Emperor Hadrian gave a statue of himself to the Greek cities, like Corinth that he visited (like the reverse of tourist photo leaving his own image in locations he visited). There are some great statue gifts but like all gifts there are some that make you question the taste of the giver and wonder what you will do with the gift. In the City of Melbourne’s storage depot there are shelves of small object d’art that it has been given as official gifts.

Alison Weaver & Paul Quinn, “Three businessmen who brought their own lunch; Batman Swanston and Hoddle”

Melbourne does not have an international gift equivalent to NYC’s Statue of Liberty, a gift to the USA from the Republic of France. The Three Businessmenwho brought their own lunch; Batman, Swanston and Hoddle is a gift from the small island nation of Nauru. It was presented as gift celebrating the 150th Anniversary of the City of Melbourne unveiled on 20 April 1994 by his Excellency, the President of Nauru Hon. Bernard Dowiyogo M.P. How exactly this statue became a gift and why was it made by two Melbourne sculptors, Alison Weaver and Paul Quinn, remains one of the secrets of international diplomacy.

The Three Businessmen… on Swanston Street broke the drought of sculptures in the city brought on by the controversy over Vault (aka “the Yellow Peril”). And heralded changes to Swanston Street as the pedestrian areas were expanded, traffic reduced and more sculptures were added. Three Businessmen… is arguably the most significant public gift sculpture in Melbourne and is a firm favourite amongst locals and visitors.

A lion in Tianjin Gardens

Less significant but certainly still greatly appreciated is Tianjin Gardens, the Chinese garden above Parliament Station. “Presented as a gift by the Municipal Government of Tianjin People’s Republic of China 1999”. With its traditional Chinese lion sculptures gardening the entrance and a wonderfully weathered rock standing in the middle of a pool it creates a serene urban garden. The essential feature to this garden’s popularity is that it has plenty of places to sit.

All that I have been able to find out about the reciprocal gifts that Melbourne has given other cities is that The City of Melbourne did give a tapestry by Adam Pyett to the City of Tianjin. (If anyone knows anything more please comment).

Other cities in the Melbourne’s greater metropolitan area that have acquired some sculptures as official gifts include:

Antonio Masini “Man of the Valley”

Antonio Masini’s Man of the Valley from Italian cities of Viggiano and Grumento is at Coburg Lake Reserve (see my post).

Petros Georgariou – King Leonidas 2009

Petros Georgariou’s King Leonaidas from the Greek city of Sparta is in the mall at Sparta Place in Brunswick (see my post).

The oldest of these diplomatic sculptural gifts are the two busts that were given to Melbourne for the 1956 Olympics. The marble bust of the Italian poet Dante Alighieri was a gift from the Dante Alighieri Society of Italy. The Italian government also give an unlikely companion for Dante, a statue of Italian radio pioneer Marconi. Both these busts are now at the Museo Italiano in Carlton.

Uses of Art in Public Space

The Uses of Art in Public Space was a free public research symposium on Tuesday 12^th of March hosted by RMIT University’s Design Research Institute and convened by Quentin Stevens. Held in the “Design Hub” (RMIT Building 100); that building on the corner Victoria and Swanston Street covered with round plates of glass.

The conference looked at public art in a broad sense to include commissioned and unofficial artworks, memorials, street art, advertising, and street furniture – all topics that I’ve looked at in this blog. Jane Rendell of University College London in her opening address on “The Use of an Object” spoke via video about the use value of public art as distinct from exchange value of private art. Rendell also noted that to use an object is to relate to it.

This was followed by two talks about the unconventional use of public art and street furniture by parkour and skateboarders. Mirko Guaralda presented a paper by himself and Christopher Rawlinson, QUT on “The Art of Parkour of Art”. And Mat de Koning and Tim Yuen from Perth gave an excellent talk on “Skate Sculpture” (check out their website). Both parkour and skateboards change the normal navigation features of the city; edges become paths and the presence of spectators can change a path to a node.

Anton Hasell, the artist who created Melbourne’s Federation Bells, spoke about “Art in Public Space as Multi-Sensory Sites of Experience”. Hasell is a technological optimist who wants shared creative interactive public spaces.

Karen A. Franck from New Jersey Institute of Technology in her paper “The Life and Death of Public Art Works” gave a basic structure to what can happen to public art: occupation, addition, subtraction, multiplication, (re)moving and destroying. Another paper that gave structure to the issue was Quentin Stevens “The Ergonomics of Public Art”. Stevens looked at the opportunities afforded by public sculpture: a table, a shelter, holding on to, leaning on, a challenge or something to fall off. As opposed to the way that city councils think about how to make areas less useful with anti-seating, anti-climbing, anti-skateboard knobs and skate-stoppers.

Then there were several papers that looked at specific examples of using public art. Shanti Sumartojo from Australian National University spoke about “Trafalgar Square’s Fourth Plinth: creating and contesting national identity”. Julia Lossau of the University of Bremen talked on “Tree Planting: The use of public art in an urban regeneration project in Glasgow”.

Kate MacNeill from the University of Melbourne gave a paper on “The quotidian life of art in public places” looking at the ordinary, unmediated engagement with public art: touch, play, emersion and contemplation with examples from familiar Melbourne public sculptures. And, to complete the variety of public art covered by this symposium, Lachlan MacDowall of the Victorian College of the Arts spoke about “The Uses of Street Art”.

Finally there was a panel discussion that ranged across a variety of topics that had not been covered in the symposium from the relationship between artists and architects to the moral rights of the artist to determine interactions. The symposium presented lots of ways of looking at the use of public art that will influence my thinking on the topic for years to come.

Heroes of Every Nation

Melbourne has never been a united city; it has always been divided between the European and the Aboriginal (not to forget the Chinese, the Afghans and Indians). Melbourne is still divided along lines of ethnicity, politics, class and religion. And sometimes the social divisions are translated into metal and stone with memorial statues to heroes.

Melbourne has statues to heroes of every nation: Robert Burns for the Scots, Daniel O’Connell for the Irish, General Gordon for the English, Dante Alighieri for the Italians, King Leonidas for the Spartans in Brunswick and General Sun Yat Sen in Chinatown. The existence and location of the statues demonstrates and reflects the political power of that particular community.

Daniel O’ Connell, 1891, Thomas Brock

Daniel O’ Connell, 1891, by Thomas Brock A.R.A. is located on the grounds of St. Patrick’s Cathedral. Thomas Brock (the A.R.A. on the plaque indicates the Brock was still an association member of the Royal Academy, he became a full member later that year) was an English sculptor who sculpted the British Royalty making him an odd choice to sculpture the Irish nationalist hero.

Robert Burns Memorial, 1904, G.A. Lawson in Melbourne 

Robert Burns Memorial, 1904, G.A. Lawson in Montreal

The Robert Burns Memorial, 1904, by G.A. Lawson is located in the Treasury Gardens. There are many other copies of this memorial in Dublin, Melbourne, Montreal, Winnipeg, Halifax and elsewhere, including Burns home town of Ayr. The sculptor G. A. Lawson (1832-1904) was born in Edinburgh most noted for the statue of Wellington on top of Wellington’s Column. The Melbourne’s memorial was commissioned by the Caledonian Society, presumably the united societies, as there were no fewer than fourteen Caledonian Societies in Victoria at the time.

The General Gordon Memorial, 1887 by William Hamo Thorneycroft is located in the eponymously named Gordon Reserve near Parliament. William Hamo Thorneycroft (9 March 1850–18 December 1925) was a British sculptor and like G.A. Lawson a member of the New Sculpture movement in the 19^th Century. The statue in Melbourne is the same as the one in London except that the granite plinth is significantly higher and includes four bas relief panels depicting historical periods of General Gordon’s life: China 1863-4; Gravesend 1865-71; Sudan 1874-80; Khartoum 1885.

The marble bust of the Italian poet Dante Alighieri came into the possession of the City of Melbourne as a gift from the Dante Alighieri Society for the 1956 Melbourne Olympic Games. Originally it stood in Treasury Gardens with a bust of the radio pioneer Marconi but both were removed in 1968 due to vandalism. In the 1990s both busts were briefly displayed in Argyle Square before Dante was again defaced. Both busts are now at the Museo Italiano in Carlton.

Now all Melbourne needs (if it needs any of these statues) is statues of Gandhi, Nelson Mandela and who else?

Public Sculpture & the collective consciousness

Why do I write about Melbourne’s sculpture? Most art critics and art historians are not interested in a collection of bad to mediocre art but I am because public sculpture shows the collective consciousness of the city. Love it or hate it public sculpture says something about the identity of the city. The taste of homogenous consensus maybe bland, even ugly, but to those in power it is acceptable. Public sculpture is concerned with the perpetration and manipulation of memory and space in collaboration between artists and city councils.

The idea of a collective consciousness was invented by French sociologist Émile Durkheim to refer to the public expression of shared beliefs and moral attitudes that operate as a unifying force within society. A collective consciousness is like a public superego exhibiting the ideals that the public aspire to. It tries to tell the official history or represent the shared values and aspirations of a culture. It is different from a ‘zeitgeist’ because it is intentionally expressed.

Bertram Mackennal, George VII Memorial, 1920

Public sculptures because of their durability are excellent representations of the collective consciousness. Public sculpture is the collective consciousness of a city exposed in something like an archaeological cross section with all the layers clearly defined by the commission and installation dates. From the 19^th through to the 21^st century, from Melbourne’s first public sculpture, Charles Summers’s River God Fountain to the very latest Laneway Commissions.

Melbourne is of a similar age to many cities and what has happened with Melbourne’s public sculpture is representative of many former British colonial cities around the world, including in the USA. Melbourne’s sculpture initially was part of the English art tradition. In the 19^th century the English and Australian establishment were essentially the same; Australian sculptors trained at the Royal Academy or the Royal College of Arts. The sculptor Bertram Mackennal was born in Australia and lived in England, India and Australia.

Public sculpture reflects the way that the city is understood. It is an image for the city, an expression of civic pride and the idea of civic good. Originally a public sculpture was intended records a triumph, to memorialise ownership, to preserve and glorify the memory of a king, queen, general or hero. The height of plinths was an indication of the glory of the heroic sculpture. During Melbourne’s history plinths, the architectural support for the sculpture, have become smaller or disappeared completely.

Melbourne has changed as dramatically from the small settlement founded in 1835 that used horses as transportation to a large modern metropolis. During that time there have been many changes to the way that people use public space, the way that people think about Melbourne, their values and aspirations. There has been major political changes, Australia changed from a British colony to a separate country. Given these dramatic changes in the city and its infrastructure it would be surprising if public sculpture hadn’t changed equally dramatically.

Steaphan Paton, Urban Doolagahl, Melbourne City Council Laneways Commissions 2011

There is another cross section of the work of sculptors in the foyer of the NGV at Federation Square with a selection of busts by local sculptors over the 20^th Century. Many of the sculptors were familiar to me because of their public sculptures in Melbourne – Paul Montford, Bertram Mackennal and Web Gilbert. The busts are not arranged chronologically but the layers of different styles are still clear. It is like looking at a series of stone tools from an archaeological dig; there are same basic forms with modifications and changes in techniques and materials.

Dadswell & Porcelli & Australian Racism

Lyndon Dadswell (1908–1986) was 21 years old when he was commissioned to do the frieze for the interior of Melbourne’s Shrine of Remembrance. He had just finished his training at East Sydney Technical College (1926 – 1929) and the Julian Ashton Art School (1923 – 1925). He considered himself far too young to be working on a national monument.

Dadswell had been given the job at such a young age because the committee wanted an Anglo-Australian working on the Shrine. Dadswell was to replace Pietro Porcelli (1872 – 1943) an Italian born sculptor based in Perth. Porcelli was disliked by both the Shrine’s chief sculptor, Paul Montford and by the architect Philip Hudson. Hudson was openly racist about his dislike for Porcelli, and along with others, wanted “British” labour only on the Shrine.

Pietro Porcelli did not have a good time in Melbourne. On 16 July 1926 The West Australian reported Pietro Porcelli was “knocked down by a motor car while crossing an intersection in the city yesterday. He was admitted to the Melbourne Hospital suffering from concussion, a broken front bone, broken leg and abrasions. His condition is serious” According to the article Porcelli came to Melbourne to work on the Town Hall; I don’t known if that was completed.

Porcelli was out and young Lyndon Dadswell was in. Porcelli returned to Perth where he died, allegedly a virtual recluse on 28 June 1943. There is a memorial sculpture to Procelli by Greg James 1993, in Kings Square, outside St John’s Church, Fremantle, Western Australia. Dadswell went on to have a glorious career. He was commissioned created the twelve freestone panels to adorn the inner Shrine and after Montford’s death Dadswell became the chief sculptor for the Shrine. He was the first sculptor to be appointed an official war artist of the Second World War.

This is not the only example of racism in Melbourne’s public sculpture. Italian sculptors had previously been a controversy when the Scottish born James White (1861-1918) who immigrated to Australia 1884 employed Italians to work on the Queen Victoria Memorial (1907). White was in a bind as he depended on the skill of the Italian stone carvers to work the Carrara marble for the multiple figures on the large monument. After this James White received no other major state commissions.

Australian racism was enshrined in the White Australia policy and exhibited in all kinds of petty ways. And while Melbourne’s public sculpture from this period does not overtly exhibit this racism (aside from muscular nationalism); their history records its and the ghostly presence of racism haunts the sculptures.

unknown orphan sculpture, 118 Russell Street

I started looking for more about Dadswell after trying to attribute the frieze at 118 Russell Street (it was suggested to me that it might be the work of Dadswell). There is also the frieze on the top of the Freemason Hospital in East Melbourne that I have not been able to attribute. Dadswell did do friezes for commercial buildings his sculpture “Progress” at Rundel Mall in Adelaide. They could also be the work of one of Dadswell’s many students, like the South Australian sculptor, Rosemary Madigan.

Frieze on the Freemason Hospital, Sth Melbourne

These possible attributions are based on style; both have a similar style, with art deco archaic figures that have been influenced by archaeology of archaic Greece and Crete. And Dadswell admired the formality of archaic art as can be seen in his Birth of Venus (1944) at the Art Gallery of NSW. Before getting the commission for the Shrine Dadswell was studying with British sculptor Rayner Hoff at East Sydney Technical College. Hoff’s art deco sculptures were consciously trying to modernize the classical tradition. Dadswell cites his own influences as Carl Milles, the Swedish sculptor, Epstein, and Henry Moore (James Gleeson Interviews: Lyndon Dadswell, 8 June 1979).

If anyone has any information about the attribution of these two sculptures please leave a comment.

Hobart Public Sculpture

I went on a weekend visit to Hobart to see MONA and the Tasmanian Museum and Art Gallery. Hobart is an attractive city to walk around even with the cold of earth spring. I couldn’t avoid seeing the public sculpture as I walked around the harbour. “Public art and artists can make a valuable contribution to the built and natural environment by celebrating, marking and revealing aspects of a community, its history, its character and its aspirations. A strong sense of place, identity and community invariably makes Hobart attractive to live in, work in and to visit.” (Hobart City Council website)

I enjoyed walking through Battery Point, the Salamanca Market (lots of woodcarving and woodcraft) and the Salamanca Arts Centre Precinct and along the harbour to the Tasmanian University Arts Centre. Along the way I saw a number of public sculptures along with other pieces of public art and design – gates, decorative paving and monuments. There was nothing out of place although some of it appeared a bit over the top, in particular the sculpture of Stephen Walker.

Stephen Walker was born in Balwyn, Victoria in 1927 and studied art at Melbourne Teachers College from 1945 to 47. Walker’s sculptures are over the top, neo-baroque spectacles; there are too many elements and too much going on. There are long explanations on bronze panels about the sculptures. Bronze is used to as much as possible and it is not surprising that Walker lives and works at his sculptor’s foundry at Campania, Tasmania.

Stephen Walker, Heading South, 2002, bronze

Walker’s “The Bernacchi Tribute: Self Portrait, Louis and Joe”, 1998 and 2002, is a series of bronze sculptures located between Victoria Dock and Macquarie Wharf. There is so much going on in this sculpture; it even has two names and two plaques. It started as bronze seal and penguins and then after a bronze camera on a bronze tripod, a bronze explorer, bronze skis, bronze dogs become “The Bernacchi Tribute” but somewhere along the way picked up the title, “Heading South”. Walker has himself made two voyages to the Antarctic in 1984 and 1986.

I preferred Walker’s more abstract “Tidal Pools,” 1970; the bronze fountain now in Mawson Place, Hobart but I never got a close look at it in its new location due to the traffic. “Tidal Pools was commissioned by the Bank of New South Wales, later Westpac, in the early 1980s. It originally stood in Sydney’s Martin Place. In 2000, when the bank extended its building, it donated $100,000 to dismantle the bronze sculpture and transport and install it as a gift from Westpac to Hobart.” (Nick Clark The Mercury 7/4/10)

Stephen Walker, “Tasman Fountain”, 1988, bronze, concrete, granite

I did take a close look at Walker’s “Tasman Fountain” 1988 or is it “Journey to Southland”, in Salamanca Place between Gladstone Street and Montpelier Retreat. It is one of the most over the top works of public sculpture that I have seen. In a circle with a rough-hewn plinth of white rock showing the Southern Cross in bronze is partially surrounded by a white concrete fountain with three bronze ships sailing in it. On the other side stands a full size bronze figure of Able Tasman – again so much bronze.

There is more to public sculpture in Hobart than the just the sculptures of Stephen Walker but they are bronze heavy weights.

Blog Housekeeping

This not about my life as a house-husband but to draw attention to my addition of two new pages to this blog: Contact and Events.

Contact

Regarding contacting me. I don’t mind getting invitations to art exhibitions, but don’t expect to see me there. If you are an artist and I have told you to please invite me to your next exhibition I really do mean it. On the other hand I hate the pushy publicists who think that my blog is just another promotional platform for their message. I wish that this wasn’t the main reason that people contacted me.

I go to openings partially to look at the art, to schmooze and drink wine – in that order. It gets difficult to look at the art after awhile because there are so many people standing around drinking wine and talking. It is kind of pointless talking to the artist at an exhibition opening with so many people saying hello and congratulating them. My strategy is to arrive early and look at the art before most of the people arrive – the flaw to my strategy is that I left before the late arrivals.

Events

The first event off the rack is a series of sculpture tours that might become a permanent event. As regular readers would know I write a lot about Melbourne’s public sculpture, now I have put together a tour of a selection of them. For more information see Events.

Other events will follow; talks, panel discussions and a book launch. If you want me for tours, panel discussions or other events see Contact.

Charles Web Gilbert, Matthew Flinders Memorial, Melbourne