by Ali Morgan

Our series of stories, Know Your Park Lands Art, guides you through various creative displays within your Adelaide Park Lands. Today the spotlight is on ‘Branchrack’, designed by CHEB (duo Christine Cholewa and Deb Jones).

At the main entrance to the Adelaide Botanic Garden (Park 11), most eyes are pulled towards the ornate wrought iron gates and the palm fronds that stretch out behind them — and the foot traffic flows towards that.

But artists Christine Cholewa and Deb Jones, called ‘CHEB’ collectively, are after an audience that does not shuffle itself along with the crowd.

They are after an audience that might stop at the Garden, sweaty and out of breath, looking for a place to park. That is to say, CHEB are looking for Adelaide’s cyclists. Or, at least, their artwork is.

Branchrack, installed in 2013, is a bronze sculpture of a branch, outside the Garden, bent into a half-moon shape to mimic the form of a typical bike rack.

Christine and Deb are traditionally trained in glassblowing but propelled themselves into the sculptural space, drawing on their own inspirations – of all that is simple in structure and concept (for Deb) and in caring for the land (Christine).

So, it makes sense that Branchrack is a clear combination of these two things. A simple form, reminiscent of nature.

The effect of their collaboration is that Branchrack blends into its cosmopolitan environment while honouring the Park Lands that surround it.

It puts the artwork in cahoots with concepts like longevity, simplicity, and utility. All of these are the familiar, bottom-line concerns rife within any economic environment.

But Branchrack’s loyalty to nature softens that fact. It reminds onlookers that these concepts can be beautiful when they are inclusive of nature.

As such, it’s worth noting that Branchrack symbolises the very thing that the Adelaide Park Lands does: that our city — the economic hub of South Australia — thrives best when nature thrives alongside it.

Branchrack is one of 11 artworks along the Adelaide Bike Art Trail, curated by the Art Trail Project in 2013. The trail is a treasure hunt, designed for those on two wheels, to wind their way through Adelaide’s Park Lands and streets on a quest to uncover reinvented bike racks.

Branchrack is one of three bike racks that CHEB were invited to reimagine as part of the Adelaide Bike Art Trail and just one of many artworks they currently have on display in your Adelaide Park Lands.

You can read more about the artist and their work here, in our interview with CHEB.

For more articles in our ‘Know Your Park Lands Art’ series, head here: https://www.adelaide-parklands.asn.au/know-your-park-lands-art.  

Ali Morgan is a writer living on Kaurna Land, Adelaide.

Her work has been featured in the Overland literary journal and at the Brisbane Writers’ Festival.