WHEN is a sculpture not a sculpture?

  When it’s an installation, or more specifically when it’s a site installation.

  So what’s a site installation? I hear you asking.

  To find out I spoke with Jindabyne local of twenty-two years, sculptor and site installer Todd Costa. 

Site installer and sculptor: Todd Costa.

  Todd’s “backyard” is the foreshore of Lake Jindabyne and he walks it between two and four times a week.

  He’s also a keen and observant bushwalker who takes in the majesty of the Snowy Mountain area on a regular basis.

  His jaunts through the bush inevitably end up with him collecting bits and pieces of the past in the form of rusty farming implements and pieces of interesting timber for later use in his works.

  In fact he has a container full of timber and “bits” parked in the Leesville Industrial Estate just begging for inclusion in a future works.

  Todd has been a professional ski patroller, white water rafting instructor and electrician. It’s this combination of nature and electricity (in the form of lighting) that gives him the ideal artistic profile to be a “site installer.” 

  “I always like to make a statement about our area, what’s going on and relevant issues”, he said.

“The water in Lake Jindabyne reached higher than usual levels a couple of years ago and then dropped substantially, leaving exposed banks which were subjected to serious erosion. It was this that caused me to ponder the mismanagement of water levels and inspired the site installation “Boundaries.”

   A site installation is a collection of pieces relevant to the particular area and arranged in such a way on the actual site to make an artistic statement about that site.

"Pioneer" a more traditional work by Todd Costa.

  The work is only functional on that particular site and once dismantled and taken away reverts to a collection of bits and pieces.

  “Boundaries” was a protest work and Todd visited it each day of the exhibition “Sculpture By The Lake” and swept away the dust to expose the colour varieties in the ground clay.

  Another of his works; “Why”, comprising a burnt out Y shaped tree trunk was on a similar theme.

  Lighting plays an important part in Todd’s work and his electrician skills come in handy here.

  A wood and copper specialist, sometimes lining the inside of hollow logs with copper and then constructing interesting lighting effects, Todd’s site installations take on an eerie atmosphere when viewed at night.

  To me it is a worthwhile experience to wander down to the foreshore around Banjo Patterson Park at sundown, and with glass of “Champers” in hand, let Todd’s site installations lead you into another world.

  Between January 4^th (8.00pm) and January 14^th you’ll be able to do just that because he is displaying a collection of twelve items along the lake foreshore.

See you there.      

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