Corinbank 2009

With the Pedal-powered Bumper Cars up and running from last year, I was free to express myself more creatively at this year's Corinbank festival. The festival had acquired a burn permit and weather conditions looked like they would allow for some fire art.

I wanted to express aspects of Australian culture in my work. I acquired various pieces of metal that are important to Australians, such as a bowls mower, a lawnmower leaf catcher, a "barbie", a tea kettle, and various farm equipment. Only the Hills Hoist clothesline inspires more pride in the Australian heart than a barbie and a lawnmower. I added to this the legend of the infamous bushranger Ned Kelly and created NED 3000, a robot chopper outlaw burn barrel:





His head is surrounded by a barbed-wire crown of thorns.

Ned carries a removable zombie-killin' shotgun with underslung brain corer:



The second sculpture was "Evil Tick-tock," a portly wood-devouring robot comprised of cultivator blades, a barbeque, and a tea kettle:





His hand was beaten on the forge out of an old pitchfork. When you place a log in his hand and pull down on the lawnmower handle, his mouth opens and he dumps the log into his flaming, greedy jaw.

These pieces will appear at the in2CHANGE gallery show at the Belconnen Bus Interchange in the Australian Capital Territory April 20-May 8