Installing Mikala Dwyer's 'The Silvering'

Mikala Dwyer’s sculpture The Silvering is one that defies gravity. Made out of mylar and helium-filled ‘0’ shaped balloons, the work draws on a combination of art historical and personal references. The most profound inspiration was the artists’ mother, Dorothy Dwyer, a modernist jeweller and silversmith who created sterling silver forms similar to those found in artwork.

“The Silvering is a floating ghost sculpture. It does what you don’t expect sculpture to do, to hover…While many of my other works are earthbound, The Silvering is trying to lift off”
– Mikala Dwyer.

We were able to capture our team installing Dwyer's large-scale work in Part Two of Know My Name: Australian Women Artists 1900 to Now. Watch The Silvering take shape inside the Gallery.