'Obnoxious' weed woven into massive mullet sculpture
The 5-metre fish sculpture was never meant to reach the scale it did, but as its Gold Coast creators became more invested, it kept expanding.
Gold Coast artists Ged McCormick and Rusty Linnane have crafted a massive 5-metre mullet sculpture entirely from invasive plants and plastic litter for the 24th annual SWELL Sculpture Festival. The artists gathered invasive cat's claw creeper vine from a conservation area on the Gold Coast, as well as fishing line and plastic litter collected from nearby beaches, to assemble the fish's body.
The sculpture, one of many displayed along the Currumbin foreshore, began as a flat piece of soy sauce packet sushi but grew to its current scale after the artists decided to make a "whole mullet" in the style of an Indigenous fish trap. The vine harvesting process required several trips to Nerang National Park, where the artists selected vines to be up to 30 metres long.
The completed sculpture will be on display for the festival, which is expected to draw tens of thousands of visitors. The artists hope the eco-friendly message conveyed by the mullet will resonate with viewers, particularly younger generations.
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