Mrs Chillikebab and I recently went on a cultural outing to the Museum of Contemporary Art in Sydney. Much fun to be had peering at the various avant-garde artworks – the usual combination of quite a lot of ‘meh’, a bit of ‘ooh’, occasional ‘aah’, and even the odd ‘WTF?’.

Amidst the piles of broken concrete fragments, lines drawn on walls, bags of coloured water and out-of-focus video installations was a bicycle. Not a normal bicycle, to be fair – it was an exhibit. A bicycle as an aesthetic object, indeed. It was in fact three bicycles sort of squished together, with bulbous triple tubing, three chains and wonderful triple-spoked wheels.

As I looked at it, I of course was contemplating this re-imagining of an everyday object; considering the kinetic aspects of the sculpture and the melding of ideal forms to create a sympathetic yet confrontational commentary on our lives and choices.

But alongside all that, the primary thought in my head was ‘can you actually ride it?‘. I was of course tempted, but I’m not sure the gallery staff would be that pleased if I had jumped on it and gone for a spin around the gallery…

Anyway, kudos to artist James Angus for recognising that a bicycle is a work of art. And kudos to us bicycle riders for the kinetic sculpture we create every time we ride our bikes.