Blink and you’ll miss Saturday sculpture spectacle

THREE installations from prize-winning Mandurang Valley sculptor Andre Sardone’s ongoing sculptural series Big Bang will be on display for a brief few hours tomorrow (Saturday 28 February) at the View Point Piazza in central Bendigo.

The activation is taking place at the same time as the first View Street Amplified monthly concert series on the steps of The Capital, just up the hill from the Piazza.

The works – one small, one medium and one large – are the culmination of a structural form that has evolved over many years within Sardone’s arts practice.

At their core, Sardone explained, is a central hub from which shafts radiate outward, a form that echoes both the delicate structure of a dandelion and the primordial explosion of the Big Bang itself.

He said the sheer size of some of his pieces, including the “large” sculpture featuring tomorrow, means his practice can tend to be “quite physical” and laborious at times.

“I spent 80 hours on the bigger one so it’s quite a substantial amount of work, and each piece I handled probably seven or eight times in different processes,” he said.

“It’s quite repetitive but it’s very satisfying working with the timber and the steel and mixing them together.

“I worked on it almost every day for three weeks from four to six hours each day, but I knew what I was in for when I embarked on making it.”

He said tomorrow, with the first real action happening in the View Street arts precinct since the Gallery closed, represents “a great day to come and check out something a bit different”.

“It’s something that’s never been seen before in public, so come and have a look, grab a coffee in View Street and go and check out the music on the steps of the Capital.”

Visit Sardone’s sculptures tomorrow, from 9.30am to 4pm, at the View Point Piazza on the corner of Pall Mall and High Street.