Amanda was engaged by the City of Sydney to curate a $4million program of public art throughout Green Square Town Centre. As curator, she developed in collaboration with the City and McGregor Coxall Landscape Architects, the artist brief for this public artwork that requested artists respond to the local ecological and social history of the Drying Green Park. Kerrie Poliness was selected from a shortlist of artists with her exceptional artwork concept for Stream.

Stream takes the form of beautiful coloured and illuminated glass pathways embedded in the ground. Almost two hundred lineal meters the artwork flows across grass and paving in two sections of the Drying Green park designed by McGregor Coxall. The work responds to the Green Square Public Art Strategy in that it engages with the local existing and new diverse communities, highlights synergies between art and ecology, and reflects the historical and cultural aspects of the area.

Stream is a highly integrated artwork that draws upon Poliness’s signature ‘geometry of waves’, relating here to the waves of Green Square's social, cultural and ecological history in a state of constant flux and flow. Stream also relates to the process of connecting thoughts as one participates in the act of meandering along the coloured pathways. Poliness describes the work thus: “Stream was inspired by the ongoing relationship the Drying Green site has to water; once integral to a complex wetland system, obstructed by a dam for early industry, then submerged as a storm water culvert, it is now central to the wetland reconstructed within the Park. Reflecting upon the merging and flowing of past, present and future, my approach to this project connects the rich and layered histories and future uses of the Drying Green through the medium of water and the encounters with waves, ripples and currents. Stream is a geometric ‘wave drawing’. The idea for Stream was informed by my ongoing artistic consideration of the manifestation and behaviour of waves across various phenomena (including light, sound, water, stone, time and culture) through geometry and drawing. For me, waves are a means to describe and better understand the phases, layers and relationships between things, places and people. The flow and transfer of energy through environmental processes, geomorphology, histories, migration, cultures, ideas and stories…The six colours of Stream, approximating a rainbow spectrum, are specific wavelengths of light selected to achieve two colour-zones. Colours in the central location are cyan, yellow and pink, while the entrance area features violet, green and orange. The surface of the coloured glass is soft like sea-glass worn down by water, complementing the textures and colours of surrounding stone and tiles. Like these surfaces, the intensity of colour is also enhanced by water. Together they shift visually with the weather and light.”

Kerrie Poliness is a leading Australian contemporary artist. Her practice includes large scale wall and field drawings that relate to research investigating the natural and social histories of place, exploring the tension between systems and repetition which highlights the impossibility of perfect mass production.

Amanda worked closely with Kerrie Poliness and her team, the City of Sydney and landscape architects on the artwork development through to completion.

Artist Representation: Anna Schwartz Gallery

Images: City of Sydney