On top of a 13-metre silver mast, which leans at a 10-degree angle, a massive 12-metre-diameter yellow carbon fibre ring and six metre-long arms balance on a ceramic ball the size of a small marble which allows the ring to gently turn, dip and rock in the wind.
But without the hint of a breeze to move the structure on the morning it was unveiled, it was left to the artists to describe the turning and tilting motion that the force of the wind creates. The artists likened the motion to the tipsy effects of beer.
Halo was commissioned by the developers Frasers Property and Sekisui House in collaboration with the City of Sydney as the centrepiece of Chippendale Green, a public park due to be opened in December in the Central Park development opposite UTS and the Notre Dame University on the old Carlton United Brewery site.
Chippendale Green is built over Blackwattle Creek, the original watercourse that was buried in a convict-built drain early in the brewery’s history. It will provide welcome additional open space in a suburb with, now, less than two square metres of open space per existing resident.
