Yeperenye Sculpture

Alice Springs, Northern Territory, Australia

Public art

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Current

Checked by Project Big Things · Aug 2026

This Big Thing is recorded as still being here.

A three-metre-high walk-through caterpillar sculpture at the Araluen Cultural Precinct.

Before you stop

Use signed precinct parking and pedestrian paths; do not drive to the sculpture itself.

Venue entrance
P
Parking
at the arrival point

Private to your Passport.

PLAN YOUR VISIT

Recommended arrival available

Attraction entrance

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Yeperenye Sculpture

This pin marks the Big Thing itself. If stopping, choose a safe and legal place nearby.

Site-level location · 23.7021° S, 133.8627° E

FIELD GUIDE

The story

You walk into the caterpillar, and inside there is information about its habitat, life cycle and cultural significance.

The Yeperenye Sculpture stands three metres high in the Araluen Cultural Precinct in Alice Springs, between Central Craft and the Museum of Central Australia, and it is a collaborative public artwork. Araluen describes the interior as carrying artworks and interpretation about the caterpillar – which makes it one of the very few objects in this catalogue that is also an exhibition.

The yeperenye is central to Arrernte country and to Mparntwe, the place now also called Alice Springs. Its significance is a matter for Arrernte people to explain, and this entry does not attempt to summarise it; the sculpture's own interior interpretation is the appropriate place for that, prepared with the people whose story it is.

What can be said plainly is the object: three metres, walk-through, collaborative, in the town's principal cultural precinct alongside the museum and the arts centre.

The funding has an unusual shape. The project was created with the support of the Grand Circle Foundation, which each year brings American visitors to Alice Springs and directs money raised from their travel into community projects around the world. A caterpillar of deep local significance, part-funded by American tourism revenue, is a genuinely odd piece of modern arrangement.

Alice Springs also holds the Big Hand outside the second-hand shop, which is a considerably less serious object.

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PRACTICAL

Plan your stop

WHAT TO EXPECT

The Northern Territory Government and Araluen Arts Centre document the Yeperenye Sculpture at the Araluen Cultural Precinct. A maintained Australian performance-place gazetteer supplies a matching precinct coordinate.

ACCESS

Public artwork within the Araluen Cultural Precinct at 61 Larapinta Drive. Navigate to the precinct and use signed visitor parking, then continue on foot; the stored arrival is precinct-level rather than a sculpture-specific bay.

COMMUNITY

Visitor Log

WHAT'S NEXT

Find another Big Thing nearby

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Current

John McDouall Stuart Statue

Alice Springs, Northern Territory

A four-metre-high Mark Egan statue of explorer John McDouall Stuart in Alice Springs.

Public art

1.6 km away

TRANSPARENCY

Sources & research

Araluen Arts Centre – Yeperenye Sculpture

Araluen Arts Centre · recorded 2026-08-23

Current Araluen page confirms sculpture remains on display.

Government

NT Government – Yeperenye Sculpture

Northern Territory Government · recorded 2026-08-23

Current NT Government public-art record.

Government

What we're still checking

Open-licence image search completed 24 August 2026. No defensible reusable image with file-level commercial-use provenance was verified in the completed Commons, government/open-licence and archival/open-collection sweep.

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