Category Archives: Sculpture & installations

Christine Z II

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A few months ago, Robin wrote about the beautiful and touching sculptures of Heinz Schwarz. The implicit link between his “Clementine” (1974) and “Adolescent and horse” (1976) was the tragedy and suffering that, for different reasons, can befall young lives.

There is not so much information available about the location of Schwarz’s works. Lionel, one of our readers, recently put us on to one of the sculptor’s lesser-known bronze masterpieces. Camera in hand, I hurried off to hunt down this beautiful stuff and found another stunning study of adolescence. “Christine Z II” surveys Geneva’s Botanical Gardens from a leafy surround.

Christine Z II 1

Christine Z II (year unknown) by Heinz Schwarz

The young girl is slim, poised and lithe of limb. Her smooth skin and blatant emerging sexuality are fragile and poignant in the extreme. In contrast to her cousin “Clementine,” she emanates neither sadness nor tragedy. She seems only amused and bemused by the visitors to her green domain.

Christine Z II 3

Profile of Christine Z II

“Christine Z II” manifests resilience with a confident, pensive intelligence. It is as though she has just come to recognise the power of her feminine beauty. Will her enclosing foliage always protect her from the dark forces of our world? I hope so.

Thanks, Lionel.

Vertigo-inducing floor painting to combat mean diseases

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“Mosquitoes, flies, ticks and bugs may be a threat to your health, at home and when traveling”, says the World Health Organization (WHO) on this year’s World Health Day. In an attempt to draw attention to so called “vector-borne diseases”, and explain how to prevent them, the Geneva-based organization made a vertigo-inducing floor painting at their headquarter and at London Heathrow Airport. Together with my daughter, we had the chance to swing by WHO to check it out. Take a look at this mind-boggling piece!

WHO Illusion 1

Now, what are we looking at…? A cracked road? A hole? A look into the future? Or the past? We see a giant, evil-looking, mosquito buzzing away from a little girl holding an ill-looking doll in her arms. A woman with a baby sitting next to a pile of trash. A water-filled car tyre. A pile of something blue. The illustration-illusion-thingy makes us wonder who these people are, if they are good health, and whether the skeeter has bitten them or not!

WHO Illusion 2

Like Josi and me, most people stop, look, smile, jump and have their photo taken next to the “3D illustration” that was developed by London-based Red Door Communications. What a clever way to catch people’s attention! At Heathrow, WHO used the floor painting as a platform to test air travelers’ knowledge about malaria, dengue, schistosomiasis, leishmaniasis, onchocerciasis and other unpronounceable diseases. Take a look here:

Jomon Spider Kit by Paul March

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A fitting tribute to Paul March’s “Jomon Spider Kit” completed in 2013 is that it is currently exhibited at the Ariana Museum.  The team from Talking Beautiful Stuff go to see it. We find a huge gangling arachnoid laying in a corner as if dead for weeks. “Wow!” says Angela on seeing it. “That is so cool!”

Ariana Spider 5

JSK is composed of smooth monotone clay and chunky stainless-steel links. The workmanship stands out. The authentic spidery whorls on its thorax and abdomen make for an appealing biological contrast with its metallic components. The whole is elegant but nevertheless provokes discomfort.

Ariana Spider 2

I want to pick it up and rattle the legs. I even house a tiny desire to return at a later date with several metres of fishing line to revive it as an enormous spider-marionette.

Ariana Spider 4

I am intrigued and somehow intimidated. I would like an insight into what was in its creator’s mind when he put it together. I meet Paul at his Geneva studio. I am surprised to see no other completed works there. The surfaces and walls are taken over by – for want of a better term – a variety of bits and pieces; they include recognisable parts of what might be JSK2.  It seems his creative process involves cycles of tentative cutting, moulding, building, matching, linking, pressing and melting.

We chat. He has a ready smile. This former clinical psychologist from UK came to Geneva in his late thirties. He studied fine art and developed a particular interest in ceramics. We chat some more. I ask him about his influences. The smile broadens and he laughs at the banality of my question. An hour and a half later I am no closer to an answer. The discussion has ranged from subliminal fears (arachnophobia?) to art as a Dawkinsian extended phenotype. I am out of my depth! Later, I confess that I have not grasped what his creative world is about and that it will be difficult to write about his work. He is delighted! He would have been disappointed if I had grasped it! Whatever is inside this extraordinary mind and the creative process it drives, it has produced JSK. I know I’ll never understand. But now that I understand that I’ll never understand, I simply think “Wow! That is so cool!”