The Firkee-Wala – New Plymouth

New Plymouth, Taranaki, New Zealand

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Public art

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A six-metre kinetic sculpture composed of giant colourful pinwheels at Puke Ariki Landing.

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The Firkee-Wala – New Plymouth

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Site-level location · 39.0568° S, 174.0725° E

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The story

Six metres of giant pinwheels, spinning on the New Plymouth waterfront, in one of the windiest coastal cities in the country.

The Firkee-Wala stands at Puke Ariki Landing, and the Coastal Arts Trail describes it plainly as a six-metre kinetic work of giant colourful pinwheels. The choice of subject is close to perfect for the site: a pinwheel is the simplest wind-driven object a child ever owns, it does nothing except turn, and it is completely dependent on conditions. Taranaki's coast supplies those conditions almost continuously.

Kinetic public art is a harder commitment than static sculpture. Bearings wear, colours fade under UV, and a work that stops moving looks broken in a way a stationary sculpture never does. Installing one on an exposed seafront is a decision to keep maintaining it indefinitely.

Puke Ariki Landing sits on the Coastal Walkway, the ten-kilometre path along New Plymouth's shoreline that is among the most successful pieces of public infrastructure any New Zealand city has built – and which has accumulated significant sculpture along its length, most famously Len Lye's Wind Wand a short distance away.

That proximity is worth noting. The Wind Wand is a forty-five-metre kinetic tube that bends in the wind and has become the city's emblem. A six-metre array of pinwheels on the same waterfront is working the same idea at child height and in primary colours – the playful version of New Plymouth's serious commitment to art that moves.

Neither the sources nor the catalogue give the year and the hand behind it.

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