What started as a project to keep him out of trouble has turned into nine month long creative journey for Men's Shed member Allan Bruhn.
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Made almost entirely from rusty old tools, Mr Bruhn has created a life-sized sculpture depicting a convict chopping wood.
"The Men's Shed is getting a new home on the Oxely Highway and we wanted something at the entrance of the shed for people to know where we were," Mr Bruhn said.
"We work as volunteers and are free to work but the statue represents someone who has to work to be freed.
"Lots of convicts help build things in Port Macquarie and we wanted to show that at the shed.
"The statue is of a convict chopping wood and most of our members use wood in their work or used to work in the timber industry so it made a lot of sense when it all came together."
This is not the first sculpture Mr Bruhn has made since joining the Men's Shed when he retired more than seven years ago.
In one of his first projects he made an emu from scrap metal. He completed a two metre tall emu using a cut up gas cylinder for a body, rio bar for a beak and feet while a bike chain was used for the bird's feathers.
Mr Bruhn's newest sculpture is made mostly with spanners, wrenches, pliers, nuts and bolts welded together to make the human form.
"It took about nine months and I think it is pretty lifelike," he said.
"I have taken a lot of time with this statue and it has nostrils, ears and even indents where the fingernails would be.
"It is made with old tools and pretty much everyone at the shed has donated tools for my project so it really does belongs to us all."
The new Men's Shed is part of a $4 million Oxley Vale Lifelong Learning Centre project which includes an arts and craft centre to be built on vacant land east of the Douglas Vale Historical Homestead on the Oxley Highway at Port Macquarie.
In February Port Macquarie MP Leslie Williams announced the state government had committed $3.4 million to construct the new facility.
No timeline has been announced for when the project will be completed but the Men's Shed hopes to be in its new home by early 2020.
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