When you’re in Western Australia, you’re in for a treat. An art installation has opened — and it’s taking Mandurah by storm. It’s called the Mandurah Giants, and it’s showing now.
Do I sound like a brochure, much? Sorry. It gets better. Let me move on to who did this and why.
These mystical wooden forest Trolls are the brainchild of Danish artist Thomas Dambo and are an initiative supported by the Mandurah City Council. The display is available for viewing now. Made out of recycled pine, the exhibit is sustainable art. Margo and I decided to do what many of the Mandurah locals have done and looked at them ourselves. (See video below. Suburb locations are mentioned.)
A game goes alongside the Giants installation, similar to hide and seek. The troll’s locations are kept secret so families can enjoy discovering them through clues. When one Giant is found, a new message at its location points towards another. Five Giants await those who figure out where each is located.
The game isn’t too hard to play because the council wants visitors to find them. Of course, it does rely on those who have previously located them not to disclose their whereabouts so that new arrivals can enjoy the experience of finding them for themselves. Fortunately (or unfortunately), social media gives them away instantly. I know my Mandurah feed broadcasted updates during their construction weeks before they were complete. I knew where three of them were before the council announced it would be a game.
Nevermind.
We discovered that there’s another great clue that accompanies this popular event. The road and foot traffic increased whenever we got close to a Giant. And then we just followed the line of people walking towards it. We were like a trail of ants leading to a honey pot.
The other two locations came to me through word of mouth.
As locals, we know other locals who have already done the hunt and given up the game without a fight. In mid-conversation, they’d casually drop a location like it was nothing. “Near the Thrombolites” one friend said. Well, that’s easy for us to translate as there’s only one place to see Thrombolites. We drove to them, parked our car, and then followed the trail of ant-people into the forest. Two kilometres later, we found Giant Number Five while having fun talking to people along the way. What a laugh.
I’ve included a few extra pics in the video (above) for those visiting the forest (Thrombolites) in the south. One is a picture of the back of a colourful spider found along the paths to the Giant, and the other is a scene near the Thrombolites.
As you walk the path through the trees, you’ll experience delicate spiderwebs. The Christmas spider thrives at this time of the year. I don’t mention this to scare you, as the spiders are harmless (and tiny). The point is to mention their odd beauty. Stop and take a look at these little creatures. You can easily miss them (but not their webs). They’re smaller than a desiccated pea but fascinating. You can tell the kids that these are the cause of the invisible threads that cross the path on the way to the Giant.
Admire. Laugh. And enjoy the Giants.
Discover more from Michael Forman – Author of Dark Fiction & Drama
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