Do you ever have one of those moments walking past a statue and wondering what’s all that about? You may have strolled past it a hundred times before, but something makes you stop. You see it for the first time — or in a different light.

For me, it happened after one of our frequent Melbourne CBD breakfasts. Heading down Elizabeth Street towards Flinders, my eye was caught. Maybe it was the bank’s big digital screen, but more interesting was the bronze figure on the corner: Children’s Tree, Tom Bass’s whimsical 1963 sculpture in front of the former Colonial Mutual Life (CML) building.

A woman cradling a baby stands before a stylised tree with its squared-off top. Children play nearby. They’re all bronze, of course, yet they invite a closer look: a lizard poised on the trunk, a boy crawling round to spy it, and an owl perched above surveying the scene. It’s only a little taller than the average person, but to a child it’s something to look up to — and climb. That’s the point. Bass created Children’s Tree to be touched, clambered over, and entered like a storybook tale already mid-chapter.

Close up of Children's Tree Melbourne by Tom Bass

Who is Tom Bass?

Tom Bass (1916–2010) was one of Australia’s most influential public sculptors. Over a career spanning more than 60 years, he developed a philosophical approach centred on “totemic forms and emblems” — works that expressed ideas of significance to particular communities or to society at large. His commissions can be found across the country, from The Trial of Socrates (1954–59) to the Lintel Sculpture at the National Library of Australia (1967–68) in Canberra, The Idea of a University (1954–59), and Sydney’s P&O Wall Fountain (1963).

The fountain became infamous in 1964 when OZ magazine lampooned it for resembling a Parisian pissoir. The editors were charged with obscenity (later overturned), and Bass appeared in their defence — cementing the work’s place in Australian art lore. In 1988 he was appointed a Member of the Order of Australia (AM) for services to sculpture. The Tom Bass Sculpture Studio School, founded in 1974 and relocated to Erskineville, Sydney, in 1988, continues his teaching legacy today.

What’s so special about the Children’s Tree?

Most art, especially corporate commissions, is strictly look-but-don’t-touch. Children’s Tree is the opposite: it invites you to climb all over it. Smack bang in Melbourne’s CBD, it adds a soft, playful note among the hard-angled business towers. Bass designed the bronze figures — mother and baby, boy and girl at play, lizard on the trunk, and watchful owl above — to be part of an everyday city adventure for children. A Pooh and Tigger for your urban Hundred Acre Wood, if you like. For grown-ups, this familiar totem might make you look up from your phone, pause mid-coffee, and step in for a closer look. Just like I did.

Where is it?

It’s on the corner of Elizbeth and Collins Streets, in front of the current site of the NAB Bank (and a Betty’s Burgers if you’re peckish). Elizabeth Street/Collins Street Stop 5 in the Free Tram Zone — serving the 11, 12, 48 and 109 — is your closest tram stop.

Where else can I find Tom Bass’s work?

You’re in luck — Tom Bass’s sculptures are everywhere. In the Melbourne CBD alone, you can spot at least four pieces. Alongside Children’s Tree, children can clamber over the broad, flat back of The Genie in Queen Victoria Gardens, a playful blend of Egyptian cat and lion. At the University of Melbourne’s Wilson Hall, Bass’s The Trial of Socrates takes on a more formal tone.

In Sydney, the once-controversial P&O Wall Fountain — removed in 2017 for Sydney Metro works — has been restored and now welcomes travellers at the entrance to the new Martin Place Metro Station, flanked by works from Douglas Annand. Over at the University of Sydney’s Chau Chak Wing Museum, The Student stands in resolute sandstone silence at the entrance.

A complete list of Bass’s public works can be found here, though bear in mind, some may have moved since installation.

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