It is one of nine works showing at  the harbour-side exhibition at Barangaroo Reserve, Sydney. 

The two-part work stands at 9 metres wide and 5.4 metres high and depicts a kangaroo which has leaped out of a roadside sign. It is a three dimensional version of another work by Tipping which was a finalist in the 2016 Sulman prize. 

Titled Kangooroo, the work unites the artist’s interests in road sign language and the Australian vernacular. 

Tipping first began turning road-signs into art about 40 years ago when he ‘adjusted’ a sign to Adelaide Airport by adding an ‘e’, making it read ‘Airpoet’.

The work uses word play to highlight the fate of kangaroos which are often shot or killed by motor vehicles. But in Tipping’s work the kangaroo breaks free of its likely fate.

“There is no kangaroo, only the goodbye of ‘ooroo’,” Tipping said. “The kangaroo has vanished, leaving an iconic outline in the sky.”

The word ‘ooroo’, which appears as text on the work, is a reference to the traditional Australian way of saying, ‘See you later’.” 

The sculpture is precisely modelled from the leaping kangaroo depicted on copper pennies, which were currency between 1938 and 1964. 

The work has previously been exhibited at Sculpture by the Sea in 2016 and proved to be very popular. It saw long queues of people wanting to be photographed beside it. 

The two-sided aluminium work is currently for sale. The artists hopes it may eventually find a buyer and a permanent home somewhere in Newcastle. 

Tipping has held solo exhibitions in Sydney, Melbourne and Adelaide, and internationally in cities including London, Munich, Washington and New York.

He has completed public and private sculptural commissions throughout Australia and internationally in the USA, UK and Germany.

Sculpture at Barangaroo is on until August 20.

Find out more here: barangaroo.com