Creative sheep farmer's garden art on display

Stephen Hooper says he started mucking around three years ago, making stuff for the garden.

The Waverley sheep and beef farmer has turned the quintessentially Kiwi No 8 wire into art pieces that are displayed throughout the family garden, around the home and in a gully garden.

"I have an eye for inventing things," he said about his artistic flair.

Impressive pieces in Mr Hooper's collection of recycled wood and wire are two wetas constructed from barbed wire, with the barbs removed.

The wetas blend well in the Hoopz garden, which meanders around a gully to the south of the home garden, which will be open for the Fringe Garden Festival.

Mr Hooper and his art works are featured in the Waverley 2012 calendar and he has two pieces that will be exhibited in the Waverley Connections Art Exhibition opening this week.

His rustic character pieces are created from materials found around the farm.

Mr Hooper's wife, Vivian, said he is the visionary of the two, and turns totara battens into art.

He has just finished a large installation, The Woody Log Truck, which is reminiscent of the days when bushmen felled trees in the Waimarino region.

A gantry for unloading the logs and sawing them in half sit on the log truck on old tram lines. There's a solid macrocarpa table and chairs where visitors to the Fringe Garden Festival can sit under the Chilean fire bush.

Connections Waverley Art Exhibition opens on Friday and continues through the weekend at the Waverley Community Centre, Dallison Park in Chester St.