Reclaimed timber, lacquered bamboo, steel
134 cm (H) x 40 cm (diameter)

Totem #35 is part of an ongoing series of stacked sculptural forms built from objects collected over many years from locations across the Northern Rivers. The individual elements — turned timber bowls, dishes, platters — arrive carrying the accumulated life of the region's communities: the households they passed through, the hands that used them, the local cycles of use, discard, and rediscovery that characterise this place.

The work celebrates that story of material recovery and reinvention. Each piece is chosen not for what it was, but for its form — the curve of a rim, the weight of a base, the way it might sit in relation to something else.

Accumulated slowly and intuitively over time, the components are brought together when a composition suddenly becomes possible, when the forms begin to speak to each other in terms of rhythm, weight, and silhouette. A lacquered bamboo form introduces a note of colour and contrast against the warm patina of the reclaimed timber, while a steel ball finial draws the eye upward and completes the vertical gesture.

The work is concerned with the graphic quality of stacked form — repetition, variation, the considered relationship between elements. It references the visual language of the totem while remaining entirely contemporary in its materials and construction. Every join is precise, every element stable and resolved.

Update: Winner, Small Worlds Sculpture Prize

Totem #35 has won the Small Worlds Award and been named Overall Winner of the inaugural Small Worlds Sculpture Prize, presented by the Trackways Sculpture Trail Committee at MArts Precinct, Murwillumbah.

The award recognises excellence in concept and craftsmanship, along with the potential for a design to be scaled up into a large outdoor sculpture.

Totem #35's stacked, modular form lends itself naturally to that next step — the same logic of repetition and balance that holds the piece together at this scale would carry through just as well at public scale.

The work on exhibition at MArts, Murwillumbah until Saturday 4 July but is available for purchase directly from the artist.