Yearly Archives: 2016

A Feminine Touch with Mechanical Art Devices

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I wander into one of my favourite galleries in Geneva: the M.A.D. Gallery. It is a cool-chic space dedicated to wonderful mechanical things. I just sort of assume that this kind of beautiful stuff would be the exclusive domain of those born with a Y chromosome. Aren’t mechanics a boy thing? After all, we grew up with Meccano, Airfix and Lego and then graduated to tinkering with motorbikes that never started!

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Jennifer Townley, “Lift”

I am greeted warmly by Juliette Duru, the gallery‘s communications manager . “What’s new?” I ask. She introduces me to “Lift,” the work of Jennifer Townley from the Netherlands. Ah! A feminine touch in this exotic man-shed!

I stand before a silently moving arrangement of cogs and chains. The principal chain slowly draws ever-changing amoeboid forms on a round white background. All is beautifully proportioned. There is something immensely satisfying about it. It gives the impression that whatever this machine is designed to do, it is doing it calmly and efficiently. It is mesmerising precisely because there is an expectation of function but in fact, beyond the aesthetic, it has no mechanical function at all. I love it! No surprises that Townley’s major influence is the immediately recognisable and “impossible” graphic designs of compatriot, M. C. Escher.

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Gaby Wormann, “Callipogon tertius”

Juliette explains that this year’s collection includes another feminine touch. I am shown immaculately crafted glass display cases each containing a specimen of a huge insect the likes of which I have only seen in Africa or Australia. These are Gaby Wormann’s “Mechanical Creatures.” Stunning! She has delicately inserted hundreds of little cogs, springs and levers from watches into the exoskeletons of real beasts. I gasp at the originality, craftsmanship and attention to detail. Her pieces set up a kind of “What the ….?” moment. You could almost believe that the innards of these oversized bugs really were the stuff of a great horologist. I know that the next time I encounter some big beetle up close and in a quiet place I will creep forward and listen carefully just to make sure it is not ticking.

Wormann says she “deals with the themes of individual ethics and humanity’s uninhibited intervention in complex biological systems.” She doesn’t say “The viewer is invited to inspect a mechanical creature minutely and allow her- or himself to be filled with wonder!” For that is what one does instinctively; one doesn’t need an invitation.

When it comes to Mechanical Art Devices, I clearly have the boy thing wrong.

Love the Tate Modern

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This is a guest post by Bonnie Golightly.

Yes, I love the Tate Modern in London. It lifts me up and makes my little beating heart sing.

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Alexander Calder, Triple Gong c.1948 Photo credit: Calder Foundation, New York / Art Resource, NY

I went south of the river to see the current Alexander Calder exhibition. I now understand why people say he redefined the notion of sculpture. Beautiful, beautiful, beautiful stuff. Trademark hanging mobiles turn slowly and majestically in imperceptible drafts. The lighting is brilliant; each mobile casts a complex evolving shadow on the high white walls and those equipped with mini-gongs let out the occasional calming chime.

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Alexander Calder, Antennae with Red and Blue Dots c.1953 Photo credit: Calder Foundation, New York / Art Resource, NY

I was mesmerised. As were many others. One lasting impression I have of this gorgeous exhibition is the vast Tate Modern rooms full of people, jaws agape, gazing up at Calder’s fabulous works. I would love to re-visit with a reclining chair to rest a while and soak it all up.

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Fernand Léger and his portrait, Photo: Walter Limot. © Limot / Bridgeman images 1934

Room by room, I stepped though the creative history of this fascinating man. He was one original thinker! In the 1920s, he created a toy circus comprising little mechanical people and animals hence his interest in wire and mobility as a medium. He became fascinated by abstraction after visiting the studio of Piet Mondrian. However, his most astonishing early works were his cartoony wire portraits. He described this as drawing in space. It is beyond me how anyone could consistently achieve effective three-dimensional portraiture with only wire. One such portrait is of the painter, Fernand Léger. I love the contrast between the smooth facial outlines, the tightly coiled eyebrows and the stiff little bristly moustache!

Bravo, Tate Modern! I said to myself. Then I thought I would have a look at what else was on show and I found myself in the heart of the building, the enormous “Turbine Room” O….M…..G…..!!!!

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Abraham Cruzvillegas “Empty Lot” Scaffolding and soil boxes, Hyundai Commission 2015

Now the Tate Modern blows me away with two huge scaffolding structures together supporting hundreds of what looks like triangular seed boxes. This is “Empty Lot” by Mexican sculptor, Abraham Cruzvillegas. The soil in each box is taken from parks, commons, healths or other sites all over London. They are watered and lit by a variety of whacky lamps. But not a single seed has been sown. What grows – and in some boxes nothing obvious is growing – is what is simply there. Just like an empty lot! Cruzvillegas has always had an interest in alternative means of building. He is inspired by the popular Mexican “self-construction” approach to home-making. He says “Empty Lot” is about hope and expectation referring to what may be constructed or what might grow spontaneously. The originality, grandeur and vision of the whole concept takes my breath away. I adore it.

I have a hope and expectation that somebody will send a photo of “Empty Lot” to Talking Beautiful Stuff in a few months time. Pleeeeeease!

Love the Tate Modern too!