In Site Library - Greater Dunedin: Water Sculpture (Dunedin Hospital) (1980)

Water Sculpture (Dunedin Hospital)

Dunedin hospital, ground floor courtyard (sculpure trail #4b)

John Middleditch (Photo, Rob Linkhorn)

Insite

 

Fountain..........Dunedin Public Hospital Foyer.......Artist John Middleditch

 

The recent announcement that the Dunedin Hospital may again move the fountain by the artist John Middleditch has resurrected concerns about the proper maintenance of the work and the damage that was done to it when it was cleaned during a refurbishment of the hospital's foyer in 2002.

 

The sculpture was one of six  commissioned by Dunedin artist Shona McFarlane to celebrate the opening of the Dunedin Hospital ward block in 1980 and was paid for by public subscription. It was originally sited out of doors but was brought into the foyer in 2001 and installed in its present position behind its glass barrier. Almost immediately there were cries of protest when it was discovered that the original patina had been removed and the work was left as burnished copper rather than with its original oxidised surface.

 

 Patination of metal sculpture is one of the great mysteries of sculpture with each artist favouring a different recipe. It is a process of chemical action on the surface of a bronze sculpture to change its appearance. The Renaissance Italian sculptor Benvenuto Cellini famously recommended the urine of young boys by applied to the surface. Sam Mahon when doing bronze casting from first principals used hydrochloric acid on his Southern Man sculpture at the airport. Thereafter a wax or some other sealant is sometimes used to protect the surface.

 

We are fortunate in having an account of John Middleditch's procedure for this work. Pamela Dobier of Lake Hawea was in the studio when this sculpture was being. She remembers that they enclosed the sculpture in a tent of thick plastic which was made as airtight as possible. Inside this, a container of ammonia was placed on the concrete floor and the sculpture was fumed overnight. The ammonia gas was allowed to "work" on the copper which was then, possibly, sprayed to preserve the colour.

 

John Feilding, the director of Nyalic NZ Ltd which undertook the refurbishment, believed there was no pre-existing coating on the copper and it had oxidised over time. This is probably wrong.

However, Mr Feilding has intuitively identified one of John Middleditch's interests. The artist enjoyed the thought that his work would continue to change through the weathering process. This can be seen in the albatross work that he was commissioned to provide outside University College in 1969. This is a work of moulded bronze and the oxidised surface creates a blue patina which is still developing and changing.

 

Implicit in this idea of continuing change is the prospect that the sculpture will be consumed by these processes of decay. It might rust away.

 

It is hard not to feel some sympathy for the recent hospital administration.  They are inheritors not only of the quirks of eccentric artists but also the consequences of the managerialist ravages of the various so-called reforms that have been visited on our health services. Under these generic managers held key positions. Their utilitarian philosophy had no interest in the community spirit that encouraged architects and administrators to introduce art work into public spaces in the 1980s. They were in different to the opinions of art experts. The long-standing arts advisory committee that had the expertise to guide the art work through refurbishment disbanded in 2000 and consequently mistakes were made in the management of the hospital's valuable collection of art works.

 

 

The Arts Advisory Committee was reconstituted in January 2002. Art and conservation experts were invited to sit on it under the chairmanship of Judith Medlicott. Despite continued misgivings about the state of the hospital's collection, the new committee has set about its tasks with enthusiasm. A Master's student has set about to make a proper catalogue of the collection. Many works have been properly refurbished and rehung and other vulnerable works on paper have been given into the care of skilled art conservators.  All this quiet work has been overshadowed by the controversy over the fountain, but it indicates that there is renewed interest in the well-being of the collection, including the fountain. The committee is agreed on a new site for the fountain and are looking for ways to pay for the estimated $30,000 that refurbishment and re-siting would cost.

 

John Middleditch was born in 1906 and lived in Andersons Bay. He died in 1987. While he is not considered one of our most important sculptors, his work is not without interest. His work is strongly associated with British Romantic sculpture of the middle twentieth century and shares with that movement an intriguing surrealist strain. The water fountain with its perplexing leaf like forms is clearly one of his best works and we can only hope that a way is found to preserve it.

 

Richard Dingwall

4 August, 2004

 

 Text Copyright Richard Dingwall