Centre Five: Bridging the Gap

• Anna Parlane

I’d hazard a guess that many Melbournians’ primary point of engagement with Centre Five is a childhood memory of trying (and failing) to climb the slippery, curved surface of Inge King’s Forward Surge (1972–74) on the Arts Centre lawn. King was apparently fine with this. “Public sculpture should be used in some way,” she commented. “It didn’t even worry me when the kids used to run their skateboards up it. This sculpture is strong, and I know it can withstand any ill treatment so why not be part of the community?” Curator Jane Eckett’s Centre Five: Bridging the Gap at McClelland Sculpture Park and Gallery takes the group’s desire to be part of the community—to bridge the gap between art and its potential publics—as its core focus. The show surveys the work of the seven members of Centre Five, Vincas Jomantas, Julius Kane, Inge King, Clifford Last, Lenton Parr, Norma Redpath, and Teisutis Zikaras, focusing on their most active years in the 1960s and concluding with their final group exhibition, also held at McClelland, in 1973.