Police escorts, angry drivers: Australia’s most expensive art commission has arrived

Among the headaches of organising the interstate delivery of the National Gallery of Australia’s most expensive art commission, any fears that it might be rear-ended have not eventuated but there have been a few close calls.

Over five nights and days, Lindy Lee’s Ouroboros, a 13-tonne twist of highly polished stainless steel costing the gallery $14 million, has been slowly making its way from the Brisbane foundry to Canberra on the back of a truck.

Artist Lindy Lee with her sculpture, Ouroboros, as it was craned into position at the front of the National Gallery of Australia, in Canberra early on Wednesday morning.Credit: Alex Ellinghausen

It’s been a huge logistical effort one year in the planning, and involving a specially marked route through the towns of Goondiwindi and Dubbo, police escorts, and a kilometre-long convoy travelling mostly at night to deliver its payload.

Dense fog delayed the convoy in Dubbo and a terrible road accident ahead halted it for hours just outside Wagga Wagga. On at least two occasions, impatient drivers jumped traffic queues to drive straight in the path of the convoy bearing the packed artwork.

“Luckily, the [driver] was able to evade them, but it was a narrow thing,” Lee said.

All the while, the work’s black plastic wrapping has been shredded by winds, doing what Lee describes as a “slow striptease” to reveal something of the artwork’s outer skin.

Render of Lindy Lee’s Ouroboros. Credit: Courtesy of artist, UAP and Sullivan+Strumpf © Lindy Lee

Lee has been accompanying Ouroboros on its highway procession and was sitting next to the pilot and gallery director Nick Mitzevich when the rig arrived at the gallery in the wee hours of Wednesday morning.

By 7am, the sinuous sculptural artwork had been craned into the gallery’s forecourt, where a reflection pond and pedestrian bridge will be built in coming months in readiness for its October 25 public opening to mark the 40th anniversary of the NGA.

“It’s in place. Immense gravitas,” Mitzevich says.

Mitzevich hopes the naysayers will now be silenced by the work’s ingenuity and majesty.

“The whole object is nine metres long, seven metres wide and 4.6 metres high and there is no internal frame,” he says.

‘[This is] a culmination of my life’s work … I’m 70, it’s taken me 70 years to get to where it’s possible to make a marvel such as this.’

Artist Lindy Lee

“It’s enormous and the engineering has been complicated, and once installed you can actually go into the sculpture and experience it inside and out. It’s been such an engineering feat to put all those components together, so the work appears to float. The fact that it is the first sculpture made without an internal frame has given the work immense complexity but also immense magic.”

The permanent installation is the highest price paid for a work of art by an Australian artist.

The cost raised eyebrows four years ago because Lee was not a big international star but a local artist whose auction prices had not yet cracked the multimillion-dollar mark.

Ouroboros is craned into position, at the front of the National Gallery of Australia on Wednesday morning.Credit: Alex Ellinghausen

Lee’s collectability has since surged off the back of the commission and the NGA will stage an exhibition of her work to coincide with the official unveiling of Ouroboros. A maquette of Ouroboros made from more than 50 kilograms of pure Australian gold is also to go on display.

Within striking distance of Canberra, Lee said on Tuesday she was feeling exhilarated and exhausted.

“I think $14 million is lean for what we have produced considering the 60,000 hours involved,” she said. “I’m hoping when people see the final result the price tag will drop away, and they will think it worth it.

“I think I will be excited and might even allow myself to feel proud. This is my legacy and it’s a culmination of my life’s work. I’m 70, and it’s taken me 70 years to get to this point where it’s possible to make a work, a marvel, such as this.”

Render of Ouroboros in situ at the NGA.Credit: Courtesy the artist, UAP and Sullivan+Strumpf, © Lindy Lee

Ouroboros is based on the ancient image of a snake eating its tail – a symbol of eternal return, and of cycles of birth, death and renewal. Made of recycled scrap metal, some 231 individually cast panels have been welded together to create the structure. It has been built to last outdoors for more than 100 years.

Visitors will be able to enter the mouth of the sculpture and walk into the curved space to experience darkness illuminated by light beams emanating from the 45,000 perforations.

During the day, its mirrored surface will reflect the imagery of a floating world, be it passing cars and clouds and birds in flight. At night the Ouroboros will be lit internally and it will be accessible 24 hours a day.

Lee and gallery director Nick Mitzevich watch as Ouroboros is craned into place. Credit: Alex Ellinghausen

“I hope and trust people can appreciate that it is a very ambitious work of art that asks us to consider the temporal world we are in and the world as reflected,” Mitzevich says, adding the commission has been completed on budget and on time.

Deputy chair of the NGA Foundation and gallerist Philip Bacon predicts Ouroboros will be loved.

“The scale of it is so right for the setting, against the brutalist architect of the gallery and the High Court next door which are not particularly welcoming, but this work, particularly at night, will be like a glittering jewel that will draw people in their droves.”

Find out the next TV, streaming series and movies to add to your must-sees. Get The Watchlist delivered every Thursday.