Cranking up city pride with Hutt Park CUBE4

E Tu Sculpture Trust unveils first commissioned work

Last updated 16:44 14/10/2008

SIMON EDWARDS/Hutt News

ART MEETS SPORT: The crowd steps outside Sportshouse at Hutt Park for cutting of the ribbon around E Tu Awakairangi Public Sculpture Trust's first commissioned work, CUBE4.

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No matter how much gear you're wearing or using, sport ultimately comes back to the human. And artist Aiko Groot says that's a key element in his towering CUBE4 sculpture, which was officially unveiled at Hutt Park last Wednesday.

In what is the biggest work the Waiheke Island artist has tackled, the four aluminium cubes on the base concrete plinth stand nearly eight metres tall and can be made to tilt by people cranking handles at waist level on each side.

Aiko specialises in kinetic sculptures (i.e. those that move) and he told those gathered at last week's function that while he's proud of the artistic qualities of CUBE4, he'll be happiest if the "community feels like they own it and plays with it.

"I really, really hope that people coming down to the park will bring their kids and crank those handles."

He was excited by the E Tu Awakairangi Public Sculpture Trust's commission. "It was something I could stretch myself into."

The sculpture dwarfs humans and yet their interaction with it can make it respond to their input. He likes the fact that it "goes beyond what is accepted or what is considered ‘normal'...tilting cubes on an edge is not normal."

Pelorus Trust used its pokies revenue to fund the $4 million Sportshouse on the former raceway at Hutt Park and also picked up the cost of the sculpture as ‘icing on the cake'. Trust manager Alister Skene says the building has only been up a few months but with tenants such as Swimming NZ, Gym Sports NZ, Touch NZ and Sport Wellington, as well as the city council's Leisure Active section, it is already fulfilling its purpose of spawning new practices and partnerships that enable sport in New Zealand to grow and prosper.

Pelorus Trust had been very aware that the Hutt Park crown reserve is much cherished by the local community. As well as being attractive and functional, the building needed to be of a design that did not draw away from the fact that Hutt Park is public space. Mr Skene believes the interactive sculpture adds further to the sense that the development is part of the community.

E Tu trust chairman Greg Thomas noted that the Pelorus Trust funding of CUBE4, and Hutt City Council's contribution towards the Smiling Windmills sculpture at Avalon Park, "has got the sculpture trust out of the starting blocks on steroids".

The trustees' brief to Aiko included a requirement that the work somehow showed an interaction between art and sport. It's cranking action echoes grinders on an America's Cup yacht and Mr Thomas says trustees were unanimous in deciding that the playful and imaginative design was just what was needed.

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Mayor David Ogden, who is also an E Tu trustee, was just as enthusiastic. He says he's seen public sculptures all over the world and the best ones "lift our spirits, make us happy, make us think and are unusual". CUBE4 and the Smiling Windmills do those things and "add to the sense of dynamism" in the city.

"I believe there will be many more to come."

In the next two years, the city council is to provide seed funding for further public art works in Eastbourne and the central business district.

Hutt resident and rugby commentator Keith Quinn had last week's gathering chuckling with his verbal gymnastics as he tried to draw links between sport and art. Noting it was tough for a humble rugby commentator who normally dwells on second phase play, muddied players and ELVS (the new rules "that no-one understands") to impress "the glitterati of the Hutt cultural scene", Mr Quinn nevertheless made the art and sport connection. Isn't it "poetry in motion" when Dan Carter waltzes through a defensive gap, he asked? When the cheering goes up after a try, "isn't that music to our ears"? When a punch is landed and the blood flows, "hasn't the comparison been made with fine French claret"?

And when we talk of a giant, bronzed, interactive work of art, "that when you crank it, it goes all day", are we speaking of Aiko's new sculpture or the great Colin Meads, he asked.

But it was Mr Ogden who earned the loudest clapping. When he learned that Aiko had been sleeping in a tent at Hutt Park for the 10 days he'd been helping engineers install his sculpture, he insisted that now his family had come down from Waiheke he find a hotel for them all for the night and the mayoral fund would foot the bill.