Eye, Eye, Cap'n

Come Face-To-Face With Melbourne

Photograph copyright: DAVID McMAHON

This towering mosaic figure, titled `Ophelia', was named the official face of Melbourne by Tourism Victoria in 1996. The work is by the famous Australian mosaic artist Deborah Halpern, who lives in leafy Warrandyte and whose work has been exhibited at Canada's Buschlen Mowatt Gallery. I'm told that she begins all her mosaic projects with sketches, before creating a figure with steel mesh and spraying it with expanding foam. She then carves the final shape before covering it with a fibro-glass compound. The myriad ceramic tiles are the last step of the process.