ROCK

"Hey Brisbane, Do You Know How to ROCK!?!?"

Just like in Spinal Tap, can you imagine how many bands have played some of the more famous venues in town or the Valley, and yelled those immortal words? Well, if you're like me and you're out and about with your Homer Simpson "Born to Rock" T-shirt on, and you come across a sculpture which epitomises that, you have to stand next to it and get your kid to take your photo. I wanted to do the whole air guitar pose, but my son wasn't quite up to working the camera out well enough to get that kind of shot. Besides that, the baby also wanted to walk up and around and see what was going on!

If you come in from the College Road entrance to Roma Street Parkland, at the top of the park you'll come across this sculpture. Entitled Automatic For The People (ROCK), it is made of stainless steel and is almost 3 metres high. Perhaps REM's Album of the same name had some influence on the sculptor Scott Redford. As mass production is an integral part of contemporary culture, ROCK was fabricated using the same methods as industrially fabricated goods.

I found it interesting in reading some of the artists reviews, he has said that he doesn't like artwork which acts as a form of tourism, however here we have a piece which I think many tourists to the parkland would be drawn to. However, as is an artists want, he seems to have moved on since 2000 when this work was commissioned. There is the other association to the landscape of the parkland, but to me this work and its discrete reference to one of my favourite bands is always going to scream Rock and Roll.

Cheers, I Love Brisbane, Wes.

Click Here for the Google Map Reference for this post.