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Elephant hunting with Melbourne Zoo’s “Mali in the City”

By September 17, 2012July 29th, 2018Cool Stuff, News, Personal Work

One the of things we love about living in Melbourne is that there’s ALWAYS something cool happening. Like a few weeks ago, when colourful elephant statues started popping up all over the city.

This year is the 150th anniversary of Melbourne Zoo, and as part of the celebrations the zoo folk created a fun public art project, named “Mali in the City” after Mali, the first elephant calf ever born at Melbourne Zoo.

Fifty life-sized (baby) elephant statues were created, decorated by different artists, and then dotted around the city. The whimsical elephants were a fun addition to public spaces, with the aim of brightening up the city as well as raising awareness of (and funds for) the Zoo’s elephant breeding programme.

For people who wanted to play the ultimate elephant scavenger hunt the Zoo created a supercool iPhone app to track all 50 Malis, with a description and exact map location for each. The app only lets you tick off each elephant as ‘found’ if you are actually in the correct GPS location – so no cheating was allowed.

Brence and I took it upon ourselves to not only visit each Mali but to also photograph all fifty of them, which turned out to be a lot of fun. A friend of ours suggested we wear pith helmets on our adventures, which we totally would have done if we owned any.

All the Malis will be auctioned off later this month to raise money for Melbourne Zoo. I kind of wish they could just stay out on display – who wouldn’t want a herd of colourful elephants grazing around the place all year round?

Here’s our photo record of the 50 Mali sculptures – click the images for a larger view.

Art photography - Elephant hunting with Melbourne zoo Mali in the city

Urban Jungle

Art photography - Elephant hunting with Melbourne zoo Mali in the city

Tiger Mali

Art photography - Elephant hunting with Melbourne zoo Mali in the city

Self-Portrait and Elephantasy

Art photography - Elephant hunting with Melbourne zoo Mali in the city

Spooky Possum Mali

Art photography - Elephant hunting with Melbourne zoo Mali in the city

Humanageric

Art photography - Elephant hunting with Melbourne zoo Mali in the city

Helmeted Honeyeaters Habitat

Art photography - Elephant hunting with Melbourne zoo Mali in the city

Mali’s Crimson Song

Art photography - Elephant hunting with Melbourne zoo Mali in the city

Spot

Art photography - Elephant hunting with Melbourne zoo Mali in the city

Faunaphant

Art photography - Elephant hunting with Melbourne zoo Mali in the city

Neo Composite

Art photography - Elephant hunting with Melbourne zoo Mali in the city

Ranee

Art photography - Elephant hunting with Melbourne zoo Mali in the city

Lotus

Art photography - Elephant hunting with Melbourne zoo Mali in the city

Mali Turns The City Pink, and Night And Day

Art photography - Elephant hunting with Melbourne zoo Mali in the city

Jimbo

Art photography - Elephant hunting with Melbourne zoo Mali in the city

Bromley One

Art photography - Elephant hunting with Melbourne zoo Mali in the city

Wooly Mali

Art photography - Elephant hunting with Melbourne zoo Mali in the city

Bromley Two

Art photography - Elephant hunting with Melbourne zoo Mali in the city

Wave To Mali

Art photography - Elephant hunting with Melbourne zoo Mali in the city

Mali’s Dreaming

Art photography - Elephant hunting with Melbourne zoo Mali in the city

Mirkas Mali

Art photography - Elephant hunting with Melbourne zoo Mali in the city

Endangered Asia

Art photography - Elephant hunting with Melbourne zoo Mali in the city

Mali, Protector Of The Animals

Art photography - Elephant hunting with Melbourne zoo Mali in the city

City In Mali

Art photography - Elephant hunting with Melbourne zoo Mali in the city

Baroque Baby

Art photography - Elephant hunting with Melbourne zoo Mali in the city

Mali’s Winter Wonderland

Art photography - Elephant hunting with Melbourne zoo Mali in the city

Enceladus

Art photography - Elephant hunting with Melbourne zoo Mali in the city

Stripes

Art photography - Elephant hunting with Melbourne zoo Mali in the city

Prayer For Protection

Mali Dreams and Botani

Mali Dreams and Botani

The Frank Realities

The Frank Realities

Patch

Patch

Ming Vase Elephant

Ming Vase Elephant

Art photography - Elephant hunting with Melbourne zoo Mali in the city

Mali Is Listening To The Earth

Art photography - Elephant hunting with Melbourne zoo Mali in the city

A Pattern Of Orange Bellied Parrots

Art photography - Elephant hunting with Melbourne zoo Mali in the city

Shared Path

Art photography - Elephant hunting with Melbourne zoo Mali in the city

Same Same

Art photography - Elephant hunting with Melbourne zoo Mali in the city

Kevin Presley

Art photography - Elephant hunting with Melbourne zoo Mali in the city

No Ordinary Elephant

Art photography - Elephant hunting with Melbourne zoo Mali in the city

Jingle

Art photography - Elephant hunting with Melbourne zoo Mali in the city

Eltham Copper Butterfly Story

Art photography - Elephant hunting with Melbourne zoo Mali in the city

Elephas Maximus

Art photography - Elephant hunting with Melbourne zoo Mali in the city

Forest Rides On The Elephant’s Back

Art photography - Elephant hunting with Melbourne zoo Mali in the city

Harmony

Art photography - Elephant hunting with Melbourne zoo Mali in the city

Rusty Mali

Art photography - Elephant hunting with Melbourne zoo Mali in the city

Pond Dreaming

Art photography - Elephant hunting with Melbourne zoo Mali in the city

Here Today

Art photography - Elephant hunting with Melbourne zoo Mali in the city

Gabriel

Art photography - Elephant hunting with Melbourne zoo Mali in the city

We made it! Brence and I high-five as we tick off our last Mali outside Melbourne Zoo.

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