WILD WEST by Rob Mancini
at The Outside Gallery
WILD WEST is a large graphic installation of eleven light boxes at Paine Reserve, Newport. It celebrates survival and tenacity and also highlights the vulnerability of the local bird life in our unique industrial, urban and seaside landscape.
These works by Rob Mancini have been set free from the gallery to fly for several months at The Outside Gallery where they can be viewed during the day and glowing at night.
Journey – Black-tailed Godwits
‘The Godwits, more specifically the closely related Bar-tailed Godwit, on migration are credited with the incredible longest ever recorded single non stop flight, up to12,000 kilometres in around 12 days.’
Journey – Eastern Curlew
‘An uncommon but welcome visitor to the area, the largest of our migratory shorebirds, the Eastern Curlew, is classified as endangered and vulnerable, yet despite this, laws in place to conserve it, other species and their habitats are sadly often ignored.’
Journey – Greater Sand Plover
‘Most of our migratory shorebirds, which are summer visitors to our shores, amazingly may end up flying the equivalent of the earth to the moon and back in their lifetime.’
Peregrine Falcon and Altona Refinery
‘The awe inspiring Peregrine Falcon, aerial master and the fastest animal on the planet can often see seen blitzing across our skies on the hunt, perfectly adapted and at home in our built environment.’
Angular Pigface and Altona Refinery
‘When these salt tolerant succulents flower, they carpet the landscape in which they are found, with an intense and spectacular, expansive magenta.’
Australian Gannet/Williamstown and Newport Anglers Club Jetty
‘At certain times of the year along our entire coastline, a little offshore, you will see these sleek and streamlined birds, folding their wings, taking on a dart-like form, diving, and piercing the sea after their prey, fish.’
Australian Hobby
‘It’s always a buzz to see these little rockets, Australian Hobbies, scatter and create panic in a flock of starlings amongst the factories of the west, shown here over the old VR Stores in Spotswood.’
Kestrel – Burleigh Street Tanks
‘This little, inconspicuous and almost ethereal raptor, the Nankeen Kestrel can be seen hunting for mice, insects and small reptiles amongst the patches of wild and rough terrain of the local industrial facilities.’
Fishing Mob/Australian Pelicans
‘A common sight along our coastline and a favourite of many, the Australian pelican, while quite clumsy on land, when on the wing rising with thermals, or fishing in their synchronised ballet-like way, appear anything but awkward.’