If you thought you saw a shark riding on the roof of a car during the past few weeks, you’d be right.

A self-taught Canterbury sculptor is making waves with his latest handmade creation – a striking great white shark sculpture that took about 300 hours to complete.

Gawie Bosman, who works under the name Gawie Bosman Sculpture, has built a growing reputation for transforming recycled materials into bold, detailed and imaginative works of art.

Originally from South Africa, Bosman moved to New Zealand in 2015 and settled in the Leeston and Southbridge area, where he worked as a builder before his creative practice began to take shape.

His journey into sculpture started with music. Bosman first began making steel tongue drums from expired LPG cylinders, before his resourceful approach and instinctive creativity led him into larger and more ambitious sculptural work.

Since then, he has created everything from animals and fish to female busts, a motorbike and a life-size horse, often using materials that might otherwise have been discarded. Flashings, hot water cylinders, driftwood, oil drums, saddles, horseshoes, lamp shades and other recycled objects have all found new life in his hands.

The great white shark piece is another example of that extraordinary patience and craftsmanship.

His partner, Michelle Morrison, described the sculpture as a labour of love and a powerful example of what Bosman can create without formal training.

“Totally self-taught and I am incredibly proud of him. He’s a very humble man,” Morrison said.

That humility sits in contrast with the scale and impact of Bosman’s work. His sculptures are not small, quiet pieces. They are physical, expressive and full of movement, often carrying the marks of the materials from which they were made.

His work has already received recognition. Bosman has featured in People’s Choice awards at the Selwyn, Cashmere and Pegasus art shows, and was awarded the Premier Award at the Annual Ashburton Art Society Show.

But for those closest to him, the dream is simple: for more people to see what he is capable of.

His partner said Bosman pours countless hours into his sculptures, often with little expectation of praise.

Bosman describes his inspiration as something that can come from many places – an experience, a feeling, an opinion or simply an idea that “might look cool”.

His logo, he says, features a brain on a wind rose, representing the way his thinking shoots off in different directions.

Sometimes the finished piece does not come out exactly as he imagined, but Bosman says that is part of the process.

“What it means to the viewer, or reminds them of, is what really matters,” he says.

“I guess that’s when art speaks to you.”

For an artist who began with recycled gas bottles and a self-taught curiosity, Bosman’s work has grown into something much bigger: a celebration of imagination, persistence and the beauty that can be found in materials others may overlook.

His great white shark is not just a sculpture. It is hundreds of hours of work, years of quiet dedication and another step towards recognition for an artist whose talent is becoming harder to ignore.