Creator
Van Nishing
Rights Holder
Instagram: @van.nishing
Title
The Closed Australian Open
Coverage
Yarraville
Spatial Coverage
Victoria
Temporal Coverage
Australia
Date
2021-02-12
Format
Sculpture
Subject
Quarantine; Masks; Australia; Australian Open; Tennis
Source
Diary of an Unofficial War Artist Episode 9: "Happy new lockdown", he says. "Although it's better to have a short sharp lockdown than a long drawn out one..." Can't forget those eyes. This hotel quarantine worker had had enough. Thrust into the world of pandemic management when only a year ago was in hotel maintenance. As I sculpted the left side of his face, his eye twitched alot, so I thought it was best to convey the intense anxiety though wide open eyes. "Our hotel just wants government money, don't care about us! We're not even trained for this, and our pay is so low! And the government just wants a cheap way if managing the outbreak! Should be a solid, nationalised, quarantine system". If you look closely at the crumpled up mask, it appears well locked onto his face here, but in reality it was drooping down loosely around his chin. Was just a bit hard to convey in sculptural form. Cheap and useless this mask, especially against the new UK strain. He said it was loose because it was borrowed from a colleague on the same shift. Were there enough of them? "Don't mention the air ventilation. It's a virus's heaven. On hot, windy days, jet streams of air would rush through stair and lift wells and other gaps, pushing air all over the hotel." (I tried to capture the wind coming at his face here by leaning his head back a little.) There was no stopping him reveal his face in a local tennis court (the Australian Open tennis tournament is now closed to the public during this lockdown). Great positioning! "Had to show that I was disgusted by the corporate sector of tennis, pushing for things to be open while we're all trying so hard to contain the virus." On a final note, he said despite it being painful pushing his head through that fence, it was the best way to describe his and his fellow workers' exposure to the virus.
Description
A sculpture of a man's face staring directly at the viewer. There is a face mask covering the lower half of the face. Text to the left of the image says "Been working in hotel quarantine... Truth is these masks suck... And the ventilation took the virus to me. Private hotels shouldn't be pandemic clinics. Anyway I'm glad the Australian Open is closed."
Relation
SH
Publisher
Urban Art Mapping
Rights
@van.nishing