From Sydney transit chaos to underground hope in Mike Hewson’s ‘The Key’s Under the Mat’
An unsettling entrance
The day before I visited The Key’s Under the Mat, Sydney seemed to be quietly malfunctioning.
A Telstra outage had crippled the train network on our way from the Southern Highlands. When we finally arrived, we’d seen a kids’ movie at the Norton Street Palace. The temperature was too hot for winter, and I felt we’d all be living underground soon.
After a nostalgic walk past our old house in Leichhardt, another mysterious light rail failure left us stranded in the dog park after dark.
So it’s fair to say I felt a bit unnerved already before I took the lift four storeys underground.
Then the doors opened onto another world.
Read more: Finding Light Four Storeys UndergroundIt was weird. The space was vast, industrial and sepulchral.
Whimsy and anarchy rule
In the middle of the room, I looked up. A shower head was suspended above me. I stepped aside, but the rose was dry.
Was it post-apocalyptic? Post-climate disaster? It was both futuristic and childlike.
The space seemed almost devoid of adults. Those who were there stood on the sidelines, watching.
My children gravitated towards the green double helix (an eternity climbing frame). It was covered in kids.
A few bruises later, they found their positions.
Sacred gods of water and plants
Water, or its absence, was a recurring motif.
Plants and trees were hoisted onto timber plinths and deified.
A palm tree was tethered to a crate-sized rock with ropes, lying almost horizontal, a press-button bubbler I remembered from school days tied to its base — a little life support.
A birdbath was framed in timber, a relic in a place without birds.
Steam and subversion
A high bucket on a rope showered whatever willing or unwilling participant stood below. A shower? A punishment? Carnivalesque entertainment?
But there were towels. A huge shelf of neatly folded towels printed with blue paisley and orange flowers, all familiar 1970s and 80s designs. I recognised some of them. Neither beautiful nor contemporary, they were gawd-awful towels generously bestowed on whoever needed them.
A milk vat, with the semblance of a spaceship, had become a steam room. Its round skylight resembled a circular stained-glass window.
Inside a shipping-container sauna, the benches were old church pews intricately carved beneath the steam. These were the spaces for communion with self and others. Fit for purpose.
More ecclesiastical furniture.
A disconcerting bank of confessionals sat along the rear wall, their black wrought iron spray-painted bright silver and lined with plastic. Peeking inside, I saw they were now change rooms for privacy. It felt subversive, but how so? Reverence was jettisoned for functionality. Or was this the new sacred? Privacy? Cooperation?
Art and cooperation
On the far right, a jade-coloured sink stood against a cabin with distinctive red trim. For a moment I was reminded of the hutongs of Beijing.
Looking at the photos later, I wondered why? It was just a small cabin. The roof wasn’t tiled, probably non-friable asbestos. But it had red trim and meagre windows. It had intention. A solid foundation. It was designated for the artist-in-residence. A faint light was emitted through the little windows. Arts had a place.
The kids are the adults now
Here, a set of washing machines was suspended on a Hills Hoist. The instructions were friendly. A list of sustainable ingredients sat alongside.
When I was a latchkey kid, my little brother fell off the top of the washing line. That was our hang-out space. Anywhere up high with a view.
But it wasn’t until I saw the swings—grand park swings without safety belts or plump landing mats—that the exhibition finally made sense.
Swinging was flying. Flying was freedom.
We were underground. The children were now the adults. This was our love letter to them.
They would cooperate, be sustainable out of necessity, form a new order, and there would still be joy.
A huge barbecue fed the hungry. There was a disco and a stage with big amps, underscoring the importance of music.
The Key’s Under the Mat felt directed at the latchkey kids of yesterday—those of us whose parents were never home when we got back from school because they were still at work.
My kids and their cousins all said they enjoyed the underground park. My mother, in her seventies, said it was a bit underwhelming. She’d expected a playground.
I think I liked it more than anyone, this place I was reluctant to visit. I loved it so much I could have cried. It was emotional. Joyful. Reassuring.
It was high concept.
No matter how scorched, windswept, and uninhabitably scarred the surface of the Earth becomes, we’ll go underground.
The kids will be okay. They’ll be joyful, whimsical, brilliant.
And the arts will go on forever and ever.
Amen.
Mike Hewson’s The Key’s Under the Mat runs until 23 August 2026 at the Nelson Packer Tank, Art Galley of NSW
