Air of universality: 2023 NGV Commission considers omnipresent element

A 14-metre-tall inflatable ball has been newly unveiled in the garden of the National Gallery of Victoria.

Designed by Nic Brunsdon and Eness, This is air, is the 2023 edition of the NGV's annual architecture commission, which challenges architect-led teams to create a site-specific temporary installation.

The design competition for the 2023 commission asked entrants to consider the themes of the NGV Triennial: Magic, Matter and Memory.

Brunsdon's winning entry responds conceptually to "matter" by capturing one of the most universal and primal elements on Earth: air.

The installation uses air as a building material and gives form to the invisible.

"Air is a universal common link that is [among] the defining features of life," Brunsdon said. "The air we breathe, this thing that connects us. It can give us life, but it can also harm us."

Conceived at the tail-end of a pandemic respiratory virus, the concept is, in part, a distillation of the collective anxiety about invisible dangers in the air.

"In a very broad sense, it was trying to find something [that] spoke of the human condition and made the invisible visible," Brunsdon said.

The installation comprises an inner sphere and an outer sphere made from recycled PVC and a water ballast to keep it in place. Brunsdon explained it as three states. A fully inflated "hold" state, an exhalation state, and an inhalation state.

"It's a machine for representing what is currently in place. Capturing, holding and redistributing the air in that place at that time," he said.

The sphere also references the proposed The Fox: NGV Contemporary designed by a team led by Angelo Candalepas and Associates. "The size is comparable to the giant oculus that's being carved into the main hall."

Ewan McEoin, senior curator of contemporary art, design and architecture at NGV, said, "Air can be understood as part of our global economic, social and ecological realities. And yet, the quality of air we breathe varies depending on where and how we live. Air is universal, yet clean air is not."

"This magnificent public artwork will, quite literally, breathe life and creativity into the NGV Garden and will delight and inspire people of all ages," said Colin Brooks, Victorian minister for creative industries.

This is air will be on display at NGV International until June 2024.