Public Art Feature: The Way of the River

poem
Written By Todd Turner
 

Perforated metal artwork by Arrow Metal.
Cowper Street, Granville

Commissioned under the Parramatta Council Arts Plan, The Way of the River is a permanent public installation that utilises text and architectural metalwork to link high-density urban development to local geography. The visual identity of the building is anchored by the writing of Western Sydney poet Todd Turner, whose poem ‘Grace’ serves as the conceptual foundation for the exterior screens and awnings. 

Developed in collaboration with artists Rhonda Pryor and Kath Fries, alongside Architects Johannsen & Associates, the building features stanzas from Turner’s poem typed directly into durable, powder-coated aluminium panels via thousands of precision-mapped perforations. The physical placement of the text flows around the streetscape alongside a large-scale structural mural of custom-cut metal leaves, which tracks the path of the nearby Duck River system. Completed in 2017, the finished installation creates an ongoing, physical dialogue between Turner's verse and the passing community, recontextualizing contemporary Australian literature as a living component of the built environment.

Grace

There was something in the rain, in the way it fell.Something in the way of the birds. And in the way of the river. Something in the way it fell.Something about how the river rose, and about the stillness of the birds on the banks in the rainand about the way the air made it feel possible to forgive –and be forgiven.
 
Todd Turner
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The Best Australian Poems