About the image...
Archibald Fountain by night light - Hyde Park, Sydney
City lights illuminate the spraying waters of the Archibald Foutain, making it a favourite of night photographers.
The fountain is located at the end of an avenue of native Moreton Bay fig trees (Ficus macrocarpa) and is the centrepiece of the northern end of Hyde Park. Carved by French sculptor, Francois Sicard, and installed in 1932, the work commemoratess the association of Australia and France in World War One.
The work was executed in the Art Deco style and was bequeathed to the city by JF Archibald, a Francophile who also left Sydney the annual Archibald Prize for portrait painting. Archibald founded The Bulletin news periodical in the 1880s, a publication that played a substantial role in popularising a sense of Australian nationhood as well as Australian journalism and writing.
Today, the Archibald fountain is a meeting place for Sydneysiders. It has been photographed by noted Australian photographer, Max Dupain.
In 2005, some of the Moreton Bay Fige seen in the image were removed after they becaame infected with a soil disease.
