Temperature 2: New Queensland Art
The Museum of Brisbane (MoB) currently calls Brisbane City Hall its home. In 1920 City Hall’s second foundation stone was laid by the then Prince of Wales, the building opened in 1930 and is, to this day, considered to be Australia’s most architecturally significant City Hall.1 In early 2008 it was announced that restoration work had to start immediately in order to stop the iconic building from sinking, caused by concrete cancer. In 2010 all of City Hall’s residents will be relocated for three years while it undergoes a $215 million restoration.
For ‘Temperature 2: New Queensland Art’, Kyle Jenkins took to the building with pencil and paint, applying amorphous shapes directly on the walls and ceiling of the entrance to MoB. After following the outlines of Jenkins work my eyes were drawn to City Hall’s early twentieth century architecture. It will probably be the last time that I will closely inspect this icon before it is revamped and I have Jenkins to thank for that.
Of the twenty-two artists included in the second instalment of ‘Temperature’ (the first instalment opened in 2004) there are only a couple of examples of Queensland artists visually intervening within local settings. For Orange/White/Red, Rebecca Ross introduced orange string, white paint and red pigment into undisclosed locations, and then photographed these interventions. The photographs were taken in light dry scrubland settings in which the orange string was wrapped around spindling trees, the ends of dead branches were painted white, and red pigment was scattered in a line along a fallen tree. Though the locations remain unnamed, those familiar with the types of foliage seen within the frame would have a location in