Many mountain folk make frequent ‘milk-run’ trips to Canberra and many mountain folk, like me, share an appreciation of beautiful scenery.

   That’s why we live in the snowy mountains.

   For about four years now I’ve been making this trip regularly and taking in the wonderful vistas along the way.

   However at one point between Cooma and Canberra my eyes are always diverted to a rolling hillside horizon by a piece of derelict machinery reaching up to the sky.

   What is this thing and why hasn’t it been removed I wondered?

  
Public art on private land along the road from Cooma to Canberra: Charles Ginnever's 'Green mountain blue'.

Could it be the rusting remnants of a derrick like structure for loading rocks from a once busy quarry just left there to create a blot on the otherwise rolling landscape?

   Dark thoughts began to cross my mind.

   I must stop the car, walk up and over the hill to see for myself and maybe just push it over.

   Would I be committing a crime?

   Trespass and wilful damage on and to private property perhaps?

   But then again surely I’d be doing the public a favour by ridding the landscape of this monstrous machine.

   A voice deep within kept whispering ‘Don’t do it’, and as luck would have it, I was rescued by some mystical power from the certainty of committing a criminal act.

   Somehow it had mysteriously disappeared.

   Last weekend I met up with the general manager of South East Arts Region (SEAR) Jennifer Hunt to discuss the proposed Gateway to The Snowy River Shire and the plans to install a public artwork on a site yet to be determined within the shire.

   A committee of four experts has been formed and about 20 concept submissions have been received to date. These will be narrowed down to three and workshopped further with the view to settle on the single artist who will create a piece of public art that best reflects the essence of the Snowy River Shire.

   Works such as these come at a price and a ballpark figure of $30,000 is not uncommon.

   The money comes in the form of various grants and covers materials and the artist’s time and skill.

   Personally I feel that bits of old car engines and the like welded together to create an artwork look, well, exactly like bits of old car engines welded together.

   The metallic ‘engine bits’ eagle perched high on a street lamp at Merimbula beach is a possible exception but then again, I’ve never seen a real eagle soaring high in the vicinity. 

   While Jennifer and I spoke of art and many things I happened to mention the rusting ‘derrick’ along the road to Canberra.

   You could have knocked me down with an eagle’s tail feather when I was told: “Yes it’s been removed for restoration work. It’s a piece of public art and should be re-installed soon”.

   Public art, by definition, is for the public.

   It’s the public that has to live with it once the artist is long gone.

Public art comes in many forms including the ultra large. Antony Gormley's 'Angel of the North' dominates the skyline outside Gateshead in Northern England.

   Dare I suggest that the public should be involved in the decision- making especially when we are messing with God’s own artist; Mother Nature?

   Not to mention the temptation to commit a crime.