Category Archives: Public places

Jannisoo’s rubber tyre duck

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Tallin-born sculptur Villu Jaanisoo is a master of transforming all sorts of worn out things into beautiful and thought-provoking stuff. I stumbled upon one of his masterpieces – Rubber Duck – at this year’s Örebro OpenART, an outdoor exhibition taking place in Örebro, Sweden. Quite different from the little yellow fella many of us keep in the bathtub!

Rubber Duck

Villu Jaanisoo’s Rubber Duck at Järntorget in Örebro.

Made from recycled car tyres, the duck measures 350 x 380 x 300 cm. Jaanisoo, who also heads the Sculpture Department in the Finnish Academy of Fine Arts, explains that the material “functions in a way that the form and surface structure of the duck become almost baroque-like, relating the work with the tradition and history of sculpture making.”

Jaanisoo and his Rubber Duck made from car tyres. Photo credit: svt.se

Örebro is home to many ducks and birds. Järntorget is a famous square next to Örebro Castle. But why has our rubber friend landed here? “It is important how the work relates to the environment where it is situated, how the work itself adjusts to the history and characteristics of the site” says its maker. I don’t get it. It feels misplaced. Stranded.

Örebro Slott

700 years old Örebro Castle.

The duck is soft. It smells funny. It invites for climbing. After walking around the square, pondering for a little while, I have decided what Jaanisoo’s duck means to me. The importance of having a healthy approach to consumption. Even the most trashy, smelly and deteriorating pile of things can be recycled and transformed into beautiful stuff!

Oxford Tire Pile #5 Westley, California, USA, 1999. Photo credit: Edward Burtynsky

Leaving Örebro by car, I cannot help but thinking of my Volvo V40’s tyres. How often will I have to replace them? Will I ever get a flat tire? I almost wish to one day have enough rubber to create something. Perhaps a castle? One thing is certain, my tyres will not keep adding to mountains like the one pictured above. It is time for change.

The Rubber Duck will be on display in Örebro until 1 September 2013, when it will move back home to Retretti Art Center in Punkaharju, Finland.

The Oxley Creek Bark Canoe

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I was watching Cormorants fishing at the point where muddy Oxley Creek meets the muddy Brisbane River in Queensland, Australia, when I came across a strange sculpture.

Canoe 1

Oxley Creek, near the junction with the Brisbane river.

Canoe 2

The Oxley Creek Bark Canoe.

This is a bronze which apparently is a facsimile of an Aboriginal, bark canoe that was built to ‘acknowledge the Jagara people‘s  use of Oxley Creek’ as part of the ‘First Oxley Creek Water Festival’ in 1997. Brisbane City Council then commissioned sculptor Sean Tapner to create the Bronze at lifesize.

I felt it, tapped it and looked at it. The second thought I had, after one of admiration for the sculptor’s skill, was that if this were in the UK it would have been stolen at worst or vandalised at best. In fact it would not even have been placed in a small, suburban park on a riverbank like this for those reasons. But here it was, sixteen years on, untouched and flawless.

Canoe 3

… and in the canoe!

The canoe’s edges curl inward and I imagined how precarious I would feel sitting in it. I imagined those edges cutting into my bare skin as I paddled. I imagined the smell of fresh fish, mud and sweat; for lying in the bottom of the canoe, as if the Jagara had just hauled it up the muddy bank, is the catch of Mullet and a Blue Swimming Crab, a woven basket, a fish spear and a decorated paddle. And that’s it. Simply a realistic rendering of everyday objects. A still life? No obvious message or meaning. A council funded sculpture surrounded by Council barbecue points and some children’s swings to commemorate, in some way, a Council funded festival. But this thing was speaking to me. It forced its way into my consciousness demanding me to think deeply about it.

This canoe and its contents were resonating with rythms of an unchanging lifestyle from thousands of years ago. It spoke also of white, European, national guilt and the hypocrisy of those who believe that an ‘acknowledgement’ is atonement enough for Manifest Destiny, whilst Aboriginal peoples still suffer the legacy of it. These were natural objects because they were from a time and a culture that did not separate Man from the ‘Natural World’. Their ‘beauty’ was in their efficient functionality. Handmade, utilitarian objects, their meaning and their use the difference between life and death. No wonder it resonated.

It was only when I recognised the effect that the bronze had on me that I thought it might be a suitable subject for Talking Beautiful Stuff.

Perplexed in Place de Neuve: Thomas Schütte’s “Vier Grosse Geister”

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Schutte 1

Geneva’s Place de Neuve is dominated by a majestic bronze of General Guillaume-Henri Dufour (1787-1875.) He raises a hand seemingly in a salute to the opera house. At the base of the sculpture is “A. Lanz.” Web-research reveals nothing about this master sculptor whose skills were employed by public subscription in 1884. General Dufour was a founding member of the International Committee of the Red Cross and he presided over the First Geneva Convention in 1864.  What a guy! And here’s a monument to him in the true spirit of Geneva in the very heart of Geneva!

Schutte 2

Fifty meters away are the gates of Parc des Bastions: home to the International Monument to the Reformation. A crane-lorry is unloading four large bronze figures. I am intrigued. I have an impression of extra-terrestrials coming to Earth with a little help from humanity. Are these other-worlders going to usurp Calvin, Knox, Beza and Farel? I give the lady in charge of the installation my Talking Beautiful Stuff card asking if a blog-post might be in order when her task is complete. She never calls. She never writes. After some days, I return to Place de Neuve. I decide to write the post anyway. But I need help here. Is this beautiful stuff?

Schutte 3

People play big-public-chess at the entry to the park. My first impression of the four figures now installed there is resonance with the oversized, black chess pieces. My second impression is of liquorice humanoids!

Schutte 4

Schutte 5

Thomas Schütte’s 2003 Vier Grosse Geister (Four Big Spirits) is on loan to Geneva from the Bayeler Foundation. I admire Schütte’s imagination and workmanship. These rubber-looking, pointy, disconcerting, biped bronzes are powerful and intriguing. They are weighty. They are pleasant to feel and resonate gratifyingly when I tap them with my knuckles. I can’t help being drawn to them. However, despite their feet being solidly planted, their poses have no obvious meaning. Should they be in a group rather than a diverging line? Finally, they are grotesque. Schütte cannot have intended them otherwise.

Schutte 6

I am perplexed. It is surprising to find this work here. It draws instant attention but at the same time generates discomfort and even revulsion. A passing woman sees me taking these photos. She yells “What is this s..t?”

Schutte 7

In a cloud of marijuana smoke, a very relaxed man embraces one of the pieces. “I really love this guy!” he says. Well, at least somebody does! I can’t help suspecting that if General Dufour was not set on a four metre high marble plinth, he too would get a hug. And what would the good General – or Mr A. Lanz – have thought of these aliens on their patch? And what do you think?