In 1938 a clothing company named Bonds introduced a character to sell its underwear, notably singlets and later boxer shorts. Formed from the Australian self-image of the time of athletic, bronzed surf life savers, the character with jutting jaw and powerful chest was named Chesty Bond. Chesty even went on to have a cartoon series in an afternoon tabloid newspaper; his super powers came from his Chesty Bond undergarments.

Of course times have changed, and just recently Pacific Brands, which now owns Bonds, decided to shut down almost all manufacturing in Australia with a loss of around 1850 jobs. (Link HERE. This doubtless earned the CEO a nice bonus.

What does this have to do with anything? Before I knew even the first thing about it, I recognised Bjorn Godwin's sculpture as echoing the overall tone of old Chesty. Well, aside from the missing arms, which is perhaps a bit more Venus De Milo.

And the bubbly bits at the bottom, I'm not sure what those are about.

But the jaw, hair, chest muscles? Oh yes, I don't doubt that they're a homage to Chesty.

The plaque around his neck reads "Golden Boy, King Of Bondi".