It’s not the most creative of titles, but you couldn’t accuse John Kelly of lacking imagination in his execution of this whimsical bronze sculpture featuring a Holstein Fresian cow stuck up a gumtree. The sculpture was previously shown at Champs de la Sculpture on the Champs-Élysées in Paris and now lives permanently in Docklands.
The cube-like cows have long featured in Kelly’s work and were inspired by a rumour that William Dobell created papier-mâché cows during World War II to help disguise Australian airfields to fool Japanese airforce pilots. There’s no evidence that they actually existed, but Kelly has got plenty of mileage out of the story.