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Twenty-five years after being part of the very first Sculpture By The Sea and then being accepted into the event a further 11 times, Sydney-based sculptor John Petrie has finally scooped the $100,000 first prize.
Petrie’s winning entry, entitled 23.5°, is a monumental 2.6 m high abstract stone work. Made from two huge pieces of basalt sourced from the Brindabella Range on the ACT/NSW border it weighs 5.5 tonnes and took six months and some complex engineering to realise. The title is a reference to the angle of the Earth’s axis.
John Petrie with his winning work in Marks Park, Tamarama.Credit: Janie Barrett
“I had this idea of that angle. It just popped into my head and I thought, ‘That’s a good idea’” says Petrie, 70, from Clovelly. “I did the drawing, wrote 23.5° on it and submitted it and then I got in and thought, ‘Oh, shit. Now I’m going to have to make this thing!’
“It took me six months and a lot of stress. I had to select the stone and decide if it was too big or too little and get it out of the mountains and arrange it.
“This award … means these monumental boulders from Australia, the oldest continent on Earth, have found a place in sculpture. Art is a serious business and speaks of optimism and possibility. It shows confidence in the world.”
The top boulder in the work appears to have been sliced through and the four resulting faces are highly polished.
“One of the best things about working like this is that when you cut open the stone, you don’t know what you’re going to find,” says Petrie, who started out as a painter before turning to working in stone in his late 30s. “So when this was cut open, I saw all these little patterns. They look like stars in a way. Sort of like a Milky Way, right? So it’s a work that kind of says everything about everything.”
Sculpture By The Sea CEO and artistic director David Handley said he was “delighted” Petrie had won in the anniversary year.
“He’s been in since year one,” he says. “I’ve seen John’s practice and himself evolve over those years. This is a major, major work. “It’s been great having John on the journey with us since he first exhibited in the first exhibition. We could not be happier for him.”
Petrie’s winning work joins 104 other sculptures ranged along the 2 km coastal walk between Bondi and Tamarama. Some 450,000 people are expected to flock to the annual show, claimed by organisers to be the world’s largest free outdoor sculpture exhibition, over the next 18 days. That contrasts with numbers for the first event, in 1997, which drew a far more modest 25,000 visitors.
Already on launch day, crowds were building and visitors queuing up for selfies in front of some of the most photogenic works. Handley said social media, particularly Instagram, had become an increasingly important part of Sculpture By The Sea.
“If we have a really Instagrammable series of sculptures or even just one that people go crazy about, then our visitation will increase by as much as 10 per cent,” he says.
In recognition of 2023 being a milestone year, sponsor Aqualand has upped the first prize money to $100,000 from the previous $70,000. Aqualand also announced it had signed on as principal sponsor for another three years. Asked what he would do with his windfall, Petrie said a new ute was definitely on the cards.
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