About a dozen contemporary, non-figurative site-specific assemblages, created from locally found material. Rusted metal springs blossom like a bouquet on top of another pile. A truck tire is supported by a log. A mobile of rusted metal hangs from the branch of a tree.
The unauthorised public sculpture park just off the Capital City Trail in Royal Park. The sculptures are large enough to see them from the train between Royal Park and Flemington Bridge on the Upfield Line. I’m not sure how many years, probably before the last two years of COVID lockdowns. A wide dirt path goes past the sculptures, people walking their dogs and enjoying the spring sunshine.
Except for the path, the site is overgrown, strewn with building rubble, concrete, and granite ‘bluestone.’ Why is it here? Is it the location of the demolished building from who knows when? I look back 30 years in old Melways and can’t find anything marked. It is strange that this waste-ground is so close to the centre of Melbourne, DCM’s Melbourne Gateway “the cheese-stick” can be seen poking above the trees.
Two blue male superb fairy-wrens flit around. Something moves in the long grass. I wonder if I am in danger of stepping on a snake. I stamp my feet to send warning vibrations. Google maps notes that it is a “white skink habitat”; maybe all the rubble is their home.
It looks like it is all the work of one anonymous artist, someone with a background in contemporary art. Much effort has gone into these sculptures, both psychic and physical, as there is evidence of planning and heavy lifting. Notice that each of the three blocks piled into a column has been turned 45 degrees to the previous one. Carefully positioned blocks keep a rusted lid hanging on a concrete pillar.
Is this a revival of the 1960s Italian art movement Arte Povera? There is the use of unprocessed “unartistic” materials and rejecting the usual sculpture techniques, aestheticising and commercialisation. The anonymous creator of this sculpture garden is doing all of that. However, unlike Arte Povera, there is no social criticism evident in the work.
Perhaps if these sculptures were in a garden or even an official sculpture park, I would critique them differently. Question their heroic architectural intentions or zombie formalism. I have some sympathy towards unauthorised public sculpture.
Black Mark 
March 28th, 2022 at 10:28 AM
[…] year’s highlight was a series of unauthorised sculptures with a contemporary Arte Povera attitude installed in a field in Royal Park is, something very […]