Poatina Monument
A unique community art project involving 100’s of volunteers and 1000’s of recycled glass bottles!
The Poatina Monument is a unique community art project that was commissioned in 2004 to help the people of Poatina, past, present and future, celebrate their rich heritage as part of a special reunion of around 5,000 past residents called “Back to Poatina Day”.
The towers, which are fountains overflowing with water, are constructed from over 1700 hand-made recycled glass bricks. The bricks were made in the village by melting down over 2 tons of glass bottles collected from around the region in a kiln.
Over 100 volunteers helped in this process including a number of Trinity College students. Probably the best view of the monument can be seen when viewers climb to a platform on the small hill next to it and look down to get a big-picture view. It’s here that you can see all the different veins or pathways created around the pool in the triangular landscaped platform. These pathways, made up of different plants or found materials such as old foundation slabs of concrete, crushed brick, and old pipes, symbolise the many European countries that immigrant workers came from to work on the Hydro Scheme – but also the pathways back to many overseas countries as people now come to study and train with Fusion and go back to work with their communities.
The aerial view also reveals the greatest symbol in the work – the fact that when we stand back and look down at the bigger picture of the meaning of our ‘ordinary’ lives, we begin to transcend the ordinary and glimpse the significance of all the parts coming together to make something unique and beautiful.
NEWS BREAK
Unfortunately two of the five towers were damaged in a severe windstorm in 2010. Plans are currently in place to rebuild them. There is however a huge amount of work and expense, to get them back to their original form.
If you are interested in contributing to the reconstruction of this monument, please contact This e-mail address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it.