We asked: If the GST was an object what would
it look like and where would it go in a museum?
The GST is a house brick on a crude wooden
lever. It should be installed just inside the entrance to a museum
(or attached to any cash register). As you pay it swings down
and smacks you in the back of the head. The machine is adjusted
however, so that if you are wealthy, a farmer, an investor, or
another form of meretricious lay about, it strikes with less impact.
Steven Haley, Artist
A John Howard paper-maché doll, life
size (quite small), naked but wearing stark white underwear with
large red letters 'GST' written across the Y-Front along with
tiny letters underneath reading "Government Sadist Tax".
Such a minument (not monument) would be best located where egos
are most pronounced, the museum men's toilet.
Simon Leong, Graphic Designer, State Library of New South Wales
It would look like a bloodsucking parasite
floating in a bottle of alcohol, and would be displayed in context
with other ultimately terminal wasting diseases.
Peter Volk, Queensland Museum
The GST would feel and look like the luridly
coloured goopy balls that they sell as kids' toys. The ones which
you buy at the toy shop and once you pick them up your hands are
never clean again.
Louise Stirling, Drama Project Co-ordinator, Film Victoria
The GST is an object of cylindrical shape
made of some kind of porous dirty grey stone. It has an organic
appearance and looks as though it might be a fossil of some long
extinct sea creature that had no face or features that we, as
humans, can associate with. It emits a strange slightly pungent
smell. For display purposes it can be kept outside as it does
not seem to be affected by the elements. If displayed indoors,
it is necessary to keep it in an airtight cabinet with a fume
extractor. Visitors are fascinated by it but even with extensive
labelling and audio-visual interpretation, evaluation shows that
visitors gain little other that a general impression. Its recent
discovery in Australia meant that scientists have been correct
in
believing that GST is a worldwide phenomenon similar objects
have been found around the world. Museums in general have avoided
acquiring GST's, but once acquired, they are notoriously difficult
to remove. They become an icon treated with similar reverence
to Phar Lap or CSIRAC, but regrettably without anyone being able
to positively identify their social or cultural worth. However
they are a money spinner-it is said that the fumes have an addictive
effect on visitors.
David Demant , Project Curator, Digital Technology, Museum
Victoria