monochromed welded steel
9,5 x 5,0 x 3,3 m
exhibition sites:
Esplanade, Eindhoven, 1991
De watertoren, Vlissingen, 1994 - 1995
City of Vlissingen, 1996 - 2023
Tower of Impeccable Notes
1991 - 1992
The Tower of Impeccable Notes, was conceived as part of the tower project “Torenhoog” organized in Eindhoven in Holland in 1991. The project concept interpreted towers historically as a status symbol, as is in fact the case all over Italy, but particularly so in San Gimignano near Siena in Tuscany. In this small hilltop village, as merchant families increased their wealth, it was fashionable to express this by building a tower as an addition to their dwelling or villa. In times of strife when civility and diplomacy broke down, of which even during the Rennaisance there were plenty, the inhabitants would inevitably start shooting at each other from their towers. These historical factors and social tensions were the inspiration for my tower, constructed as an example of process in motion, actually being built by climbing on itself to the top of itself (without a crane), where the final image was also a testament to the folly at hand, the perils of vanity becoming concrete, or steel in this case. This implies, of course, that the finished tower can be safely climbed, a sculpture as architecture.
Related Works from the Chair Series
1986-1991
image 1:
Tower Study
1990
collage, drawing on paper
30 x 21 cm
exhibition venue:
Torenhoog, Esplanade, Eindhoven, 1991
images 2-3:
Model #2
1991
polychromed bronze
33 x 24 x 20 cm
exhibition venue:
Phoebus, Rotterdam, 1993
image 4:
Musical Chair (maquette)
1988
bronze
40 x 32 x 26 cm
exhibition venue:
Trammell Crow Center, Dallas, 1990
Related Works from the Chair Series
1986-1991
The Tower of Impeccable Notes is a direct extension and development of the Chair Series, and more specifically the Musical Chair (1988-1989). This began by investigating the chair as a sculptural motif in 1986, starting with Sitting Chair (scroll to bottom), appropriately described as…”someone both present and absent is sitting here in an armchair both absent and present.”* This process included innuendos of historical examples, exploring the “animalness”, and thereby also the “humanness” of four-legged objects, in turn becoming even more animated, and a series of sculptures - linear drawings in 3D space - began to emerge.
In one of the early maquettes, Musical Chair (1988), a celebration of music and dancing, the chair seeks to free itself, wanting to float upwards. A year later, having started enlarging some of the most appealing chair models, a simple but unique means of construction was developed, which took on its own significance, issuing a power and intensity in the more complex dialog between the structures: the part holding/supporting, and the part being held, the intended sculpture. Although these first larger works were finished as intended, I returned to this more complex imagery, being intrigued on the one hand by the introduction of architectural gestures into the chairs with their many associations and possibilities. And on the other, as the constructions became more complicated due to the overlapping layers and visual vibrations inherent to these 3D drawings - the front layer rubbing against the background layer as the viewer changes position - these developments eventually lead to a concept for a tower, and ultimately the realisation of the Tower of Impeccable Notes.
* Daniel Milhaud, “Forward”, David Smithson - New Work (exhibition catalog, 1990), pg. 2.
image 1:
bronze
175 x 120 x 114 cm
images 2-5:
bronze
175 x 120 x 114 cm
Fonderia Mariani, Pietrasanta
images 6-10:
wax, brass wire, bamboo
175 x 120 x 114 cm
artist's studio, Pietrasanta
exhibition venue:
Trammell Crow Center, Dallas, 1990
Musical Chair
1989
As the chairs continued looking for ways to animate and free themselves, they suggest participating in a musical celebration of their own making; playing, listening, dancing. Even though its title alludes to the children’s game we all played at one point or another, however cruel it might seem in retrospect, the maquette for Musical Chair (1988), including the enlarged version, are about something else. The idea that there is always a loser until there is only one winner left fits perfectly into the dogma of any capitalistic society - basic training for elitists - so what could be more perfect than this to teach our kids about the trials and tribulations coming their way. Having said this, my musical chairs are more concerned with what happens before the music ends, the uplifting act of making and listening to music, of dancing, and how it might even free a chair from its static function, the sculpture from its bondage, humans from their fate, ourselves from ourselves, or even better, the human in us from the elitist.
Developing the enlarged version of the Musical Chair (1989), with its inherent architectural process, I became fascinated and inspired by the dynamic between the rational/structural and the organic/poetic elements of the constructions. Where does an element need support before it comes crashing down? What is music without a rhythmic basis? The original ideas were to be finished as planned. These new structurally complex notions would be explored in separate works related to the evolution of the Tower of Impeccable Notes, like Model #2, Catapulta Umana and Kabeau Jalou.
image 1:
bronze
106 x 122 x 95 cm
images 2-3:
Trammell Crow Center, Dallas
Big Chariot
1989
Another of the larger sculptures derived from the earlier Sitting Chair, realised first in the model Chariot (1988) appears almost as a phantom, a hybridization of a chariot, horse and driver/rider combined into one, possibly with the hint of a rickshaw. This apparition tells a short history of human mobility and coping, a ghost of centuries gone by, before industrialisation really kicked in and seemingly blew the game wide open. The resulting composition portrays some mythic figure, a nostalgic presence thrust into the throb of contemporary life, looking for a sense to it all, teetering on the verge of commentary, or confession.