Celebrating 40 Years Of Living Lagoon

Stephen Walker’s Enduring Gift To The Burdekin

A prominent art installation within the Burdekin Shire, Stephen Walker’s timeless Living Lagoon sculptures have stood in the forecourt of Queen Street’s Burdekin Theatre for almost half a century.

2025 marks exactly four decades since Walker’s work was unveiled in the region, and although 1985 was many moons ago, the sculptures continue to attract much attention and admiration from locals and travellers alike.

Hailing from North Balwyn in Melbourne, Stephen studied at the Royal Melbourne Institute of Technology and then later under the guidance of Launceston’s Jack Carington Smith at the Hobart Technical College before becoming a professional sculptor, painter, and educator in 1954.

In the early years of his career, Stephen worked alongside prestigious English artist Henry Moore in Britain, Rome, Florence, and Prague before returning home to study birdlife with ornithologists Don and Pat Serventy in Australia’s Furneaux Islands in Bass Strait.

Over the course of Stephen’s professional career, his talents were recognised and celebrated on several occasions. In 1983, Walker was presented with the Advance Australia Award for his contribution to the arts, an Order of Australia for Services to Sculpture in 1984, and he holds spaces in all major galleries across the country as well as over 30 major commissions.

Living Lagoon was designed to pay tribute to the abundance of wildlife and the significance of water within the Burdekin Shire. The sculptures were carefully cast in the Coal River Valley in Campania, Tasmania, where Stephen lived and worked until he passed away on 16 June 2014 at the age of 86. Now, 11 years on from his passing, Stephen’s talents have been forever immortalised across the nation, with four of his bronze works holding honourable listings on the National Heritage Register.

Take a moment to visit the granite and bronze sculptures to appreciate the outstanding talents of Stephen Walker and see Ayr’s very own piece of the artist’s impressive legacy for yourself.

‍

Photo Source: Burdekin Shire Council

‍