Meet the man behind Queensland’s ‘bin chicken trail’

Australian Community Media

Overnight, sculpted metal ‘bin chickens’ began appearing around parts of Brisbane. Two years later, artist Ryan Forster has unmasked himself as the ‘bin chicken man'. As his bin chicken trail gains greater notoriety, the artist has begun his next campaign to build a 10 metre tall ‘Big Binny’, with hopes his artworks may even be considered for the 2032 Brisbane Olympics mascot.

Transcript

00:00Okay, check this out. It has got to be my favorite build for the bin chicken trail so far. Look at that, how cool.

00:08Two night bin chickens holding swords.

00:11It's up now on top of Round Table Coffee in Bracken Ridge.

00:15Yeah, it kind of started with just the idea of

00:19making one and putting it up somewhere just a

00:22little bit of a sneaky install so that someone would wake up and drive along and

00:27see a bin chicken out of the corner of their eye and do a bit of a double take because it's holding a beer.

00:32So I did that. The 4X Brewery were up and people started asking, oh, can you make one for us, make one for us.

00:37So yeah, fast forward almost two years later and there's

00:42almost 200 out there and they're about 40 on public display. So on the actual bin chicken trail itself

00:49and yeah, the rest just hidden away in homes and pool rooms and yeah, everywhere else.

00:55Look at this distinguished gentleman.

00:58Look at the way he is sitting. Yes, very distinguished. I see, I see.

01:04It takes a fair bit of time to make each one. I have got a template for the actual bin chicken itself,

01:11which is it's laser cut and I fold it up and then spot weld it and all the accessories. So like the legs,

01:18what pose they're in, what they're holding might have to make all those generally from scratch and that can take quite a bit of time.

01:26But all up each bin chicken probably takes about two days. So yeah, it's a bit of a long process.

01:32It's the unfortunate reality. You put something out there and it's possible that it's going to get stolen.

01:40And there's a, I want the art to be accessible and that's where there's a bit of a fine line.

01:45You want it to be able to be seen and enjoyed by the public. But if you make it too accessible,

01:51then you run the risk of someone wanting it and being able to take it.

01:56And that's what happened with the Dandy cinema one. They wanted it in a garden bed at ground level

02:03so people could have photos with it. But it also meant obviously that someone could take it and that's

02:08what happened. And there are a few other ones. There's a toothbrush binny that's gone missing from

02:14Waterworks Road and that was installed up on top of the building. So someone went to great lengths to take

02:21that, which I guess in some ways it is an honor that people like it so much that they want to take it.

02:28But it's selfish to be honest. It's taking away all the fun and joy from everyone else. So

02:35yeah, I'd really like people to think about that and maybe possibly return things and have a bit of

02:41a conscience. But yeah, I live in hope. Ever since I've made the first one, it's been in my head to

02:48make the Big Binny an actual proper tourist attraction, something that really cements the whole

02:55journey of this, you know, the Binchikin Trail. And it's like, this is it. This is what it all

03:00culminates in. So I've been waiting for the right time to start campaigning for it. I have spoken to

03:07a couple of councillors about the possibility of using council land. One was pretty open to it at one

03:15point. So if I have another conversation with them and, you know, we can secure some land, then

03:20and I'd love for it to be big enough to actually be a proper big thing. So, you know, I'm thinking

03:2610 meters or so. There's a lot of big things out there in Australia that aren't quite big enough to

03:31be the real, really impressive. Like the big banana is massive. It's great. But like even this morning,

03:38I drove past the big shoe and it's not that big. Come on, you gotta go big.

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