By Clare BruceSunday 4 Oct 2015Hope BreakfastCultureReading Time: 2 minutes
A family of human-sized cleaning spray bottles has become a crowd favourite at the Sculpture By The Sea exhibition in Sydney.
The annual sculpture event, open until November 8, is expected to attract 500,000 people and this year features more than 100 sculptures on the beachside walk from Bondi to Tamarama.
It’s the largest sculpture exhibition in the world.
“Dame Cockatoo And Enoturage” by AnnetteThas
Megan Hales, one of the artists from the RCM Collective who created The Bottles sculpture, told Hope 103.2’s breakfast team that the giant plastic human-like bottles were meant to be both serious and fun.
“People can come up and push the trigger and have a shower, wash off, squirt each other, so it’s a bit of fun,” she said.
“It’s also reanimating the issue of plastics in our water, and we’re opening a conversation where the public can decide how much [water] is used, while also having fun with it.”
With her fellow artists Corey Thomas and Roger Mitchell, Megan worked for around three months, seven days a week, to create The Bottles artwork – designing, carving, moulding, engineering and painting, followed by installing.
“Plasticworld (2009)” by Carole Purnell & Nuno Maya
Megan recommended that people do the whole walk to take in all the exhibited works of art.
“There’s so many great sculptures, and there’s such a range, and all kinds of artists too, which is really nice,” she said. “Some young, some really established. It’s a great thing to do with the family.”
The exhibition includes many beautiful, eye-catching metallic shapes, statues of human figures, animals, painted cars, and abstract works designed to provoke thought.
“Incendiary” by David McCracken
Other standout works include:
- Gift Of The Rhinoceros – a rhinoceros sculpture
- Pillows – a series of giant red pillows
- Happy Floating Dream Cloud – a large bunch of hanging colourful plastic objects
- Flying Fish – a large metallic flying fish suspended on a pole
- We’re Fryin’ Out Here – a giant frying pan
- Bubble no.5 – a red boy’s head blowing a chewing gum bubble
- Man On Ball – a series of figures sitting on globes
- Incendiary – a large red shining torpedo
- #thestormiemillproject – a giant pink bunny-like figure
- Nest – a huge collection of security cameras
- Dust – a giant metal sculpture of a hand with dust running through it
The Bondi exhibition has become so popular that a sister exhibition has begun in Perth, called Sculpture by the Sea, Cottesloe, held in March each year.
“Halfgate” by Matthew Asimakis