Images of Canberra - Diamonds and the High Court

the globe was originally made for an exhibt at the Pompidou in Paris, after that exhibition it was acquired by the NGA for permanent display. The gallery and the high court have lightning rods atop of the buildings.

The first one was supposed to be a temporary work hung only for a very limited time… from memory the gallery chose to leave it there alot longer than intended before it all came down in a storm. This one has been installed perminantly and as such should last a whole lot longer.

Have they done anything to protect this one from lightning? Is there anything they can do?

Otherwise it seems Neil Dawson has got onto a pretty good lurk – get commissioned for a sculpture made of lots of metal suspended high in the air with handy earthing wires … wait for the inevitable lightning … and get to do it all over again … and again … and again.

No simto, you’re right. The old sculpture was, I think, called Globe and looked kind of like the earth as seen from sattelite photos with all the clouds and stuff. It either got hit by lightning or was severely damaged in a storm in about 1998 and, although Mr Dawson still had the die he had cast it from, word is that he refused to make another copy and so the gallery had to pay for a new artwork.

Personally, I liked the old one a whole lot better.

The sculpture that was hit by lightning was, I think, a different one, and the lightning damaged it enough to requrire replacement.

There was a whole argy-bargy about whether the sculptor was prepared to reproduce the old one or not, and it ended up meaning that we got a new sculpture that looks kinda different hanging there.

Or am I mis-remembering this?

Apparently it was struck by lightning a few years ago. That would’ve looked awesome.

Interesting fact: Neil Dawson is also the sculptor/designer of the new bomber command memorial at the War Memorial.