2008 Lindisfarne Abbey on the Fish of Māui

This sculpture was the second artwork for Lindisfarne College in Hastings. Located more within the school, than the first, rather than acting as the flag-bearer out front, it stands between dorm rooms and the cafeteria, a sculpture people view from a variety of positions, being able to move up close and sit beside and against the work, and also seen from the stairwell looking down on the work from above.

The work ‘speaks’ of the land here, and its connection to the site of Lindisfarne, in the Northwest of England, this geographical location curiously linked to the school as symbol in New Zealand in the antipodes half the globe away. Reading about the Holy Island of Lindisfarne, and confirmed when the artist visited the island a few years later, the most significant relic on the island seemed to be the ancient Priory which dates to the 12^th century.

This sculptural tribute tells a tale of relocation by creating a gigantic plinth out of a rising fish-head, the fish that Māui in New Zealand’s legends pulled out of the sea to create the North Island. Balanced above, by a series of untidy props, is a small piece of land whose precariousness and the gap between it and the fish suggest the Holy Island of Lindisfarne. On this stand is depicted the remains of the Priory, a rendering as symbol for that ancient site in Britain.