“Collusion” [2012]
wood and acrylic
72″x60″x60″
(Based on Giambologna’s “Hercules smiting the centaur Nessus”.)

What to say about this piece… um, well, it is a way of using the silhoutte of the same classic sculpture from 2 view points, yet confusing the issue so that one of them must always be turned away. One face effectively grounds the structure, bearing the brunt of the tension, as it lifts the other face up and away from itself.

I was thinking about two main ideas while making this: 1) a sculpture should interact with it’s site and be reliant on it and 2) in any struggle for dominance both parties bear responsibility for the other.

In Giambologna’s sculpture the characters have attained a level of static dominance with Hercules mounted and about to strike the contorted centaur. Comparatively the Loggia dei Lanzi, where the sculpture is housed, is a still space that frames the struggle with sweeping groin vaults, the hints of tension can be found in the iron trusses bracing against the gravitational force from the vaulted ceiling, also in a static pose yet constantly threatening collapse. I am not claiming that my piece has this kind of graceful, timeless struggle and tension. I am merely mentioning that I have begun thinking about as related to the sculpture itself.

And on a more lighthearted note: I faux-painted the octagonal wood grain on the front figure. Hooray for deceit and fakery!

09 Dec This entry was published on December 9, 2012 at 5:35 am. It’s filed under Art and tagged art, centaur, collusion, hercules, ryder, truss, wood. Bookmark the permalink. Follow any comments here with the RSS feed for this post.