Since 1994 I have been making sculptures out of books and compressed paper. Click here to see some.

An early work was a 2 metre high pile of recycled paper called In Tray (shown on the left).

Another was In Form, a book form with a figure shaped space cut through the book.

One work consisted of 500 cut phone books assembled into a tunnel of names in the Committed exhibition at the Fremantle Arts Centre in 1996. Click here to see it.

The largest was a 4 tonne sculpture in the foyer of the High Court of Australia in Canberra in 1998. Click here to see it.

My intention was to comment on the everyday overload of information on paper. To read more about this aspect of my work click here.

Many other artists are now using paper for sculpture. To see their work click here.

The paper figure in the Park 2002-4

The orginal "paper man" in the park was made from documents and glossy magazines donated by the Town of Vincent Council, the community and The Language Centre.

A hole was drilled through the middle of each report and then it was threaded onto a 2m long threaded rod. A large nut at each end was tightened, resulting in the paper becoming compressed.

Paper is made predominately from wood. So by compressing paper I am creating a compressed wood. The theory is that it should be as durable as a hardwood. Unfortunately these have been little, if any research done in this area, so this work was a test work.

The local Town of Vincent allowed me to install this test work in a park over the summer months to see if the theory worked.

The work was installed in the inner-city Robertson Park at dawn on October 9 2002, with the help of Brad Stapleton, Terry Dowling, Umberto Alfaro and Paul Carstairs.

After three months I dismantled the work and examined the ageing of the paper. Then I recycled the more durable types of papers from this into a new work on a new steel rod.

The Arch 2004-2007

I used glossy high quality paper Perth Mint annual reports because of their evocative nature, plus colours and durability. These are difficult to commercially recycle, often ending up at the rubbish tip.

The reports have been drilled under compression, at Applecross Senior High School, and more recently at the studio.

New techniques were developed to compress the paper over the arch as the paper was untreaded, re-organised and re-treaded up to 20 times.

The steps were: Compress, drill, knife trim, thread and compress, carve (using the Arbortech™ Industrial Woodcarver), disk and belt sanded, and seal.

The arch was a research project into further developing the mechanical techniques for making this type of work, i.e. a scaling up and speed of creating the work, to enable the work to become more expressive.

The project was assisted by the Commonwealth Government through the Australia Council, its arts funding and advisory body.

Following on from the arch (see image to the left) a second, larger figurative was carved. The latter incorporates some aspects of the earlier work, but has a form similar to my current paperclay work.

A 12cm x 120cm twin treaded wall panel is currently underway.

2005 Commission

A commission from Queensland for 22 compressed paper sulptures trigger a frenzy of activity of the studio. Around 4 tonnes of books were collected. I removed their covers and Life Editions, a book binding firm kindly cut them to the exact sizes required, despite this occuring during their office and factory move to the Perth CBD. Because each sculpture was 1 and 1/2 metres high, then over 33 metres of paper was cut by them and later drilled and threaded by myself. A gold edge was discovered on many of the books, so was presurved to add interest in the final works.

2007 Work

it was also selected for the Paperartzi Paper Art Festival organised by NewArts and the City of Albany. with the work displayed on the Town Hall Lawn for a week.

It has also been selected for "Redeeming the ruin: Art of Consumption", a exhibition that will tour regional galleries through Victoria for all of 2008. Galleries include; Deakin University, Latrobe, Mornington-Peninsula, Swan Hill and Horsham Regional Galleries. For dates and details.

2008 Commission

In 2007 I was again selected, to create a sculpture for the 2008 Southbound Music Festival in Busselton. "Sum" was a 1.6 m high circle of over 500 Annual Reports, with two spheres made from over 5,000 survey maps on opposite sides and ends. As the paper weighted over half a ton, and was on a 45 degree angle, I spent substantial time designing the supporting and internal structure to support this. Also the work had to withstand the possibility of some of the intoxicated 20,000 music fans climbing upon it! See how I built it click here.