Monday, February 23, 2015

New public work

I have been commissioned by a residential development company to build a permanent landmark sculpture for their apartment development, Park Nine at Ridgewalk, in Woodstock, GA. The complex is sited near a historic rope mill, so I was encouraged to keep that in mind.
As a Southerner, something as simple as the idea of rope can get complicated;  the imagery of rope can illicit not-so-great references, so I kept the work non-narrative and minimally conceptual, focusing on the formal aspects of rope (its linearity), and the industrial process of making rope. 
The work is essentially a simple "string art" exercise, but in three-dimensions using a non-rectangular matrix. The structure abstracts its basic profile from the sisal plant leaf - a major source of rope making fibers besides hemp. The matrix/framework will be stainless steel, and the "string art" will be galvanized steel rope. The steel rope is strung about the framework in such a way that the simple, straightforward lines create a complex series of geometries relative to the viewers position. The implied motion and seemingly complex interaction of the steel rope alludes to the repetitive wrapping and overlapping of fibers that happens in the production of rope.
During my research for this project, I watched a lot of videos about the industrial manufacturing of rope. Watching videos of rope being manufactured are quite mesmerizing. The videos lead my mind to think about String Theory in Physics, so the sculpture also playfully (non-scientifically) imagines billions of tiny fibers coming together at the apex, then expanding outward into the warped matrix that we know as space-time.

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