Questions raised over dumped art
Council’s $10k sculpture left at city tip
CAIRNS Regional Council has launched an investigation to find out how a $10,000 piece of public artwork ended up at the city’s dump, for sale for a fraction of its cost.
Oak Beach based artist Jill Chism’s sculpture Cairns in
Three Pieces was spotted in the council’s Buyback shop at the Portsmith Waste Transfer Station by a customer this week.
The council uses the shop to repurpose unwanted goods, instead of sending them to landfill. However the $10,000 artwork was being sold for a bargain at $50.
The three-piece sculpture, which was commissioned by the then-Cairns City Council, was erected in the city mall in 2001 and later removed prior to the redevelopment of Lake St.
Ms Chism said she was unsure of how the metallic sculpture wound up at the dump, but was disappointed by the discovery.
“It’s disappointing that Cairns council has spent significant effort in creating a Public Art Policy when that’s the end result of one of its commissioned works,” she said.
She said the council had contacted her to ask whether she wanted to keep the artwork, however she declined.
“I feel that public art is sitespecific, so I said I felt better if the council relocated it, because it was for that particular site (in the mall),” she said.
“It should go somewhere in Cairns. I live at Oak Beach, and a signage statement with ‘Cairns’ on it at Oak Beach doesn’t make much sense.
“I felt it would be better if it was kept in Cairns.
“Surely there could be somewhere relevant in Cairns the council could shift it?”
Division 6 Councillor Linda Cooper, the chairwoman of the council’s Cultural Services Committee, said it was regrettable where the sculpture had wound up.