The curator was engaged to source an artist and curate a highly integrated artwork with a lighting installation by Electrolight, for the beautifully designed Oculus building by SJB at 249 Crown Street. Amanda’s brief to the artist was to create a contemporary, meaningful, relevant and engaging artwork that has relevance to the site and local community, and that reflects the eclectic cultural context of this vibrant Surry Hills area. With a mature deciduous London Plane tree placed nearby, the curator also elected to make the tree part of the artist brief, asking the artist to engage with it in a creative way when developing their idea.

The curator proposed Mikala Dwyer, one of Australia’s most important contemporary artists, for the project. Dwyer she was educated at Sydney College of the Arts and COFA UNSW and has a strong affinity with the area.

The artist responded with originality and intelligence to the physical and conceptual aspects of the site. Crown Phantom is ethereal, engaging and powerful in its beauty and simplicity that contrasts with the urban clutter of the surroundings. The work creatively engages with the integrated design of the lighting, and to the physical, ecological and cultural aspects of the context as a creative precinct with eclectic night life. 

Crown Phantom is about nocturnal wildlife that is being challenged in natural habitats surrounding Sydney, and by extension the sustainability of Sydney’s nightlife and community. The image of a mother koala and its baby moves slowly and calmly in reference to the importance of life at night. Many endangered native species in and around Sydney lead their lives and do some of their best work towards sustaining a healthy ecosystem at night. The image appears and re-appears at random times throughout the course of an evening, extending upon the artists interest in apparitions. It is elusive, much like the koala’s behaviour in the wild. Viewed from certain vantage points through the London Plane tree, the warm browns and greys from the brickwork reflect the colouring of the species in its natural habitat. Within its twenty year lifespan, the artist hopes that in years to come the koala is not a memory, the apparition becoming a distressing reality.

Crown Phantom speaks to our collective desire to experience and be part of nature. It is a beautiful, poetic, symbolic, meaningful and mesmerising work that will become an iconic and well-loved part of the precinct over time. In Dwyer's own words: "This apparition of an iconic mother koala and her baby will be visible intermittently at night through the trees, and other perspectives (Goulburn/Crown streets). This image is intended as an ethereal presence that aims to re-enchant us with nature. Apparitions are something I have been wondering about my whole life: the supernatural, the spiritual, the magic and the trickery. As a believer and sceptic in parallel, I hold the possible and impossible ‘tears in the veil’ with deep respect and enjoy the pleasure they give in stretching the imagination. Apparitions seem to be dreamt up from a need to collectively symbolise and make meaning out of something—loss, fear, love, birth, death. They also address the deep imbalances around power and the sacred at different times in history. The apparitions of the virgin Mary around the world, for instance, always seem to come at times of famine, war, poverty, loss of faith and other crises. These stories become mythologies, accruing layers of meaning over time and thus human imagination outlives the tellers. It is the phenomenon of storytelling I hope to invoke through the image of a Koala appearing and disappearing quietly and randomly with nature. The vision will generate comments in passing, and word-of-mouth will aggregate into a little mythology of something seen or not seen in the city at night. People passing by might occasionally catch a glimpse, slow down and be curious. Perhaps they will tell someone who might then look for the Koala but fail to find or see it. In this gap between seeing and not seeing, Chinese whispers will ensue, and curiosity will be intensified. These passers-by, like the pilgrims described by Rachel Bobbitt, would not be a “passive audience”, but “actively create and make the charismatic occurrence through interaction, symbolisation, and interpretation of what is taking place around them.” It is intended to encourage people to actively engage with an urban place in a similar way."

Images: Amanda Sharrad & SJB