Kaldor Public Art Project 14: Barry McGee

'The stars were aligned…'

28 October – 5 December 2004

Metropolitan Meat Market, Melbourne

'Water wall mural'

28 October – 5 December 2004

National Gallery of Victoria, Melbourne

Starting his career as a graffiti artist, over the past decade Barry McGee’s signature droop-faced figures, vibrant optical patterns, tags, drips and doodles have populated vast and complex installations in museums and galleries around the world. For Project 14, McGee transformed the old Metropolitan Meat Market into a cacophony of chequerboard shapes, urban characters and cast-offs, booming and colliding with sound and energy. A mural was painted over the National Gallery of Victoria’s glass waterwall and acted as an alternative billboard for the event. Together the works evoked the sensory overload of contemporary consumer culture and paid homage to the outcasts of a disposable world.