Life In The Fast Lane - Public Art on the road.

Today I thought I’d take you on a little DRIVE.

Let’s take Eastlink, then the new Peninsula link,
one of my favourite trips…

Sorry it’s a motorway and we can’t stop.
I mean it’s called a freeway here, well actually it’s a tollway!
What do you call these roads where you are in the world?

These roads have Australia’s longest sculpture park.
Do your roads have Public Art to enjoy along the way?

These sculptures are designed to be viewed on the move
but forgive me if the photos are a little blurred.

The reason these are my favourite roads
is not the actual roads, but where they lead to…

The Tree of Life Phil Price
The Tree of Life is a 10 metres high wind-activated kinetic sculpture.
The movement is gentle and rhythmic, echoing the rhythmic flow of branches in the wind.
The large tree-like form makes reference to the eucalypt and evokes the natural beauty of the peninsula.

Oops sorry no, I don’t mean the hospital…

I’ve just come off the freeway to get you closer to the cool art

The leaves in the tree behind the car move

It’s really clever,

hmmm, maybe I should have taken a video?

It leads to Happiness!

I love these signs on the side of the road,

they are the names of local places,

The Pines written twice when you drive past at 100 km/hour (the maximum speed limit) appears to say HAPPINESS to me.

Just look at some of these sculptures

Here we have the famous Aussie Car Eating Bird…

PUBLIC ART STRATEGY Emily Floyd

Standing 13 metres high, the painted steel sculpture depicts a giant black bird ominously contemplating a worm. Drawing on aspects of the most famous outdoor sculptures, the piece describes Melbourne through its public art.

Below is the hotel where the lights are on, but no-one’s home

This one is really clever…

HOTEL Callum Morton

Constructed of steel, concrete and glass, at 20 metres high Hotel is a large-scale model of a high-rise hotel. Positioned out of context, with no surrounding structures, the artwork appears out of place,

as if belonging to another time and place.

Hotel is effectively a giant folly.

Its generic form looks like a number of places simultaneously,

as if its identity is unstable and still moving, but never quite of this world.

Now where we’re we?
Oh yes on the road to happiness
and my favourite Melbourne beach escape…

I know, I know, all the best motivational quotes tell me…

“It is good to have an end to journey toward;

but it is the journey that matters, in the end.”

― Ernest Hemingway

DESIRING MACHINE Simeon Nelson

Desiring Machine lies as a fallen tree beside the roadway, putting new roots into the ground.

Its silhouetted filigree lies like a decaying piece of obsolete agricultural machine,

a relic of the human struggle to co-exist with nature.

Designed using a Victorian floral motif, the branch-like stems are mechanical

and perfectly symmetrical rendering them unnatural.

This opposition of nature and machines describes our desire to control nature.

Phew, you have no idea whizzing along saying ‘What’s that?’
Now I can reply ‘it’s a silhouetted filigree‘ (….if I remember!)

You can’t help but enjoy the journey when you have all these interesting things to admire out the window.

“The most important reason for going from one place to another is to see what’s in between, and they took great pleasure in doing just that.”

― Norton Juster, The Phantom Tollbooth

I mean what is this one?

It always reminds me of a woolly mammoth’s tusk!

Rex Australis Dean Colls
Rex Australis explores the transience of existence and the passing greatness of the sheep industry in Australia. The sculpture made from corten steel measures 7 x 14 x 6 metres.

These roads lead to the Mornington Peninsula,
just over an hours drive for us.

As soon as we get beyond Frankston, we’re in holiday mode.

I’m thinking ocean beaches, vineyards, fantastic walks, good food. The word is ESCAPE… from city life.

So when we fly pass this space rocket of a sculpture on the road,
It is exciting as to me it always signals blast off to my holiday.
We no longer have to do battle with Frankston’s endless roundabouts and traffic lights…

PANORAMA STATION Louise Paramor

Panorama Station resembles a space-station, a rocket launch-pad or a futuristic engine.

So keen as I am to get to the beach,

I will leave you with one more quotes…

“Sometimes it’s worth lingering on the journey for a while before getting to the destination.”

― Richelle Mead, The Indigo Spell

Linking with – Our World and Blue Monday.

Thanks to our hosts: Sally our host of Blue Monday and to the hosting group of Our World Tuesday: Arija, Gattina, Lady Fi, Sylvia, Sandy and Jennifer.
Have a great week!