Since 2020, Museum of Brisbane (MoB) has been running a range of cultural tours with the aim of offering locals and tourists alike a chance to explore the city and its heritage beyond the museum walls. The opening of the Queen’s Wharf precinct in late 2024 has now facilitated a new Public Arts Tour.
Director and CEO Zoe Graham tells ArtsHub: “Our new 90-minute walking tour offers a deep level of engagement and an opportunity to explore the whole area right through to the riverfront. It includes an in-depth exploration of the multimillion-dollar public art installations commissioned by the city as part of the revitalised riverside precinct. Additionally, it also examines the history and heritage of the area, incorporating First Nations and Early Settlement history.”
In total there are currently eight major works – with more expected.
In a prominent location at the entrance to The Star Brisbane, the first sculpture is Lindy Lee’s Being Swallowed by the Milky Way. One of Australian’s foremost contemporary artists, her eight-metre high, 7.3-tonne bronze was fabricated in Brisbane. Consisting of 25,000 perforations resembling stars and illuminated from within to give a soft, ethereal glow, it symbolises cosmic unity and is a striking work.
In the pedestrian walkway by the river, we come upon Brisbane-based artist Samuel Tupou’s glass tile mosaic Lungfish Dreamz. Made with some 50,000 small tiles, the piece incorporates patterns inspired by traditional designs from Tupou’s Tongan and Polynesian heritage. This vibrant and colourful mosaic represents the river, alongside the evolution of his native lungfish.
Justene Williams’ bronze and mirror five-tonne sculpture, Sheila rises majestically above riverside offering a powerful image of female strength and sexuality. An established artist, Williams is known for her large-scale immersive works, though this is her first permanent public artwork. Linked to Irish ancient stone sculptures, the work has been placed near the old Immigration Hotel, where many Irish immigrants arrived in Brisbane during the 1880s.
Nestled alongside a peaceful stretch of riverside frontage is Destiny, Mr Wanambi’s five-metre high sculpture of three mullet fish. It is perched atop a rambling bull-shark shaped shelter, dotted with black fish shapes emulating the ‘mullet run’, as it winds towards the river.
Based further up the river, Tom Friedman’s delightful Looking Up shows a three-metre thin man looking skywards to an unknown view. Created in polished steel, crinkled to look more like aluminium foil, the work invites us to look at the everyday and familiar in a new light.
Created in 2003, John Elliott’s bust of Neville Bonner is owned the Queensland Government and on loan to Destination Brisbane Consortium. It is positioned on a plinth on the north side of the Neville Bonner Bridge connecting The Star Brisbane with Southbank. The bronze bust has Bonner’s trademark mop of hair with interspersed white strands.
Inhabitant by contemporary Indigenous artist, Tony Albert, is a cast aluminium brightly hand-coloured 15-metre floating botanical garden of native plants that will, over time, extend the full length of the William Street underpass. It sits four metres above the porte-cochère drive-through entrance to The Star Brisbane and can be viewed from a vantage point opposite.
Finally, renowned British artist Sir Antony Gormley OBE RA is represented by a 1988-89 sculpture. Fold II depicts a couple in a tender embrace and is constructed in Corten steel, a material that will weather over time giving it a rusted earthy quality.
This reviewer attended a tour with 14 others, over half from interstate or overseas. One of MoB’s Visitor Experience team, Micah Rustichelli is an enthusiastic and knowledgeable guide, who offers additional information on historical buildings, Indigenous history and the Brisbane River. As a painter, sculptor and performance artist, he is well-versed in the presentation of public art and an avid fan of the artworks in Queen’s Wharf.
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This is a fun, enlightening tour that visitors and locals alike seemed to relish enormously. Graham says: “Our range of tours are already a permanent feature of MoB’s program year-round. This new Public Art Tour is a wonderful addition and, as long as there is demand, we will continue to offer them.”’
Queens’s Wharf Brisbane Precinct Public Arts Tours are available on Wednesdays and Saturdays for the foreseeable future.
