Great Petition - New Public Artwork
The State Government, in collaboration with the City of Melbourne, commissioned a major artwork to commemorate the 100th anniversary of women's suffrage in Victoria. Great Petition by Susan Hewitt and Penelope Lee was unveiled in December 2008 at Burston Reserve, near Parliament House in Melbourne.
Great Petition is a stunning, strong and symbolic work about the struggle for women's right to vote. It celebrates this important milestone in Victorian history and honours the thousands of women whose bravery and persistence helped win women the rights we have today, thus providing an enduring focus on the issue of women’s contribution to public life.
The winning design was selected following a public call for entries and was announced in October 2006.
The artwork, fabricated in rolled steel and painted in parchment white, is a contemporary reading of the Monster Petition, a giant petition of 30,000 signatures offered to the Victorian Parliament in 1891 as evidence of widespread support for equal voting rights for women. The continuing opposition of the parliament, which knocked back numerous Bills, meant that women had to wait another seventeen years before they were given voting rights with the passage of the Adult Suffrage Act in 1908.
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