PICA opens in 2007 with a new public pool! Come in from the heat, enjoy the cool of the blue water but make sure you follow the rules or no swimming for you! PICA Pool is a major new commission by Rodney Glick for the Perth Institute of Contemporary Arts. The entire floor area of PICA’s ground level gallery spaces will be covered by a made to scale, 1:1, flat, hard-edged minimal painting. Different coloured tarpaulins are cut and stitched to create the pool’s water, diving boards, depth markings, shadows, steps, spa and cement perimeter. A walkway around the pool stops people getting wet and the upstairs balcony offers you a bird’s eye view of the action below. PICA Pool is a further development of a work produced by Glick in 2004. Entitled Lap Pool this earlier work comprised a stitched tarpaulin in the shape and dimension of an Olympic length pool, placed down the middle of a suburban street. Both works echo the painterly history of flatness and spatial play, while the coloured shaped canvas has a distinct Australian backyard familiarity. The image, while bordering on the ridiculous, speaks of the improbable and a desire to be a painter-ish.