This is a dawn picture of one of my favourite sculptures in Canberra, on Ellery Crescent outside the School of Art. Its by a Finnish artist, Olavi Lanu, and was made in 1982.

You can see it enlarged and from a few different angles here.

At first I really did think it was group of real granite boulders that just happened to look like a person sleeping. I like imagining that rocks or mountains are slumbering spirits that sometimes might stretch and come alive to go about their business when no-one is about. Of course there are lots of stories along those lines; the ancient stone creature in Patricia Wrightson’s children’s book The Nargun and the Stars comes to mind.

But Lanu’s reclining figure is made from fibreglass resin, presumably on a wire form. Apparently it was originally covered with moss, but over the years lichens have taken over. There is another figure by Lanu not far away, but sitting among some trees.