MESSAGE IN A BOTTLE

In 1960 renegade artist Lyall Randolph placed a pair of glistening bronze mermaid sculptures atop Big Rock at the northern end of Sydney's world famous Bondi Beach. Although damaged and almost destroyed by the elements over time, these Bondi Mermaids remained until 1976.

Bondi Advertising created an initiative to revive these greatly revered seaside icons, only in a way Randolph himself could never have imagined…virtually.

Message in a Bottle was a part-real, part-virtual installation featuring 3D digitally rendered mermaid sculptures. Through Augmented Reality, this meeting of tradition and technology could be viewed on a smartphone or tablet via specifically created iTunes and Android Apps.

Activated simply by aiming the device at digital markers embedded in a large vintage-looking fibreglass bottle; the Bondi Mermaid would then appear on screen and in situ and could be viewed in bronze, marble, wood and even wobbling red jelly. This image could then be captured and posted directly to viewer’s individual Facebook profiles.

Sculpture By the Sea, the world’s largest outdoor exhibition attracting over half a million visitors each year, seemed like the perfect platform to showcase <i>Message in a Bottle</i>. This the exhibition’s fist ever part-virtual installation, was well received generating both a great deal of publicity and over 50,000 App downloads. A miniature version on a plinth was also displayed in the exhibit's Sculpture Inside section.

An extension of the Message In a Bottle initiative is an ongoing online and social media public petition to revive those pieces in all their original glory, at the very same spot they once proudly sat.