A TRIO of Coffs Harbour artists, John Vanderkolk, Mark George and Jeremy Sheehan, have installed a 2.8m x 2.4m art installation weighing 148kg at Currumbin Beach, exhibiting at SWELL, Queensland’s largest outdoor sculpture exhibition which opens Friday, 9 September.

The piece, ‘Navigator’, is about telling stories of great floods, and tales of ships over the horizon alongside travels across the ocean to new possibilities.

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The three artists chatted with News Of The Area.

“I’ve loved the building of this piece because there are a lot of components in it,” said Mark.

“There’s a lot of moving parts that need to be assembled.

“I love the fact that it’s so strong, well- engineered and built but it’s also very delicate and fragile-looking and quite svelte.

“When you see it against that skyline it looks elegant.”

For Jeremy, Navigator is a piece that just keeps on giving.

“I like that every time we talk about the work more layers are revealed.

“The work has a strong significance and meaning for us, but just today John was describing a new meaning, calling it a wind vane and it kind of clicked for me…boats need to point into the wind to navigate and move…that one aspect keeps coming through in different ways.”

With the exhibition opening on Currumbin Beach, the artists are excited to see further revelations as people surround and observe the work.

“With people around it and using it as an indicator of the wind and decoding the messages behind it, more and more layers will come off which is really exciting,” said Jeremy.

For John seeing Navigator on the beach at SWELL is a line in the sand.

“It’s the full stop at the end of a process,” he said.

“As far as collaborating goes, it’s always interesting having another two sets of eyes on the piece and negotiating certain little issues is really good.

“And then being here and realising that there’s over 150 other people who’ve gone through a similar journey in creating works and bringing them to Currumbin Beach is a great experience.”

The trio is thrilled to be exhibiting at SWELL, describing it as “a pretty spectacular exhibition and an amazing space to have our work here”.

“It’s very rare that you get to put your work in front of the public in an ideal setting like on the beach.

“There’s a lot of meaning behind it,” said John.

This year SWELL Sculpture Festival celebrates 20 years with 150 entries being the highest number ever, and a new beachside SWELL Fringe Festival, opening 9 September and running through to 18 September.

For more information visit www.swellsculpture.com.au.

By Andrea FERRARI