Vacant Space 2021

I don't do this normally: install new work in a space I have never visited. But last week this was the only way: Coming more or less straight from the ferry, with a stopover at the studio to prepare the sculpture and pack tools, I arrived at Sunny Bank Mills Wednesday morning. In the evening, after working on autopilot for eight hours, Vacant Space, version 2021, stood - or rather floated - in the exhibition space. 

Many thanks to Court Spencer and Sunny Bank Mills. I look forward to visiting the exhibition, seeing the other artists' work - and assessing what I have actually done. 

Just after installation. Vacant Space is 170cm wide  

Filtering light

photo: Harlan Whittingham

8 October 2019 16:35h

In the upstairs space: watching what the light does with this installation - three slightly twisted surfaces spread from the top of the front windows to the ground. Drawn with wool from the archive this 'drawing' can be easily varied and modified. The slightly curved layers bring an element of movement into the space - they seem to ask for dance performances.


The windows at the back of the building face SW and throughout October it was intriguing to watch the changing light and how the shadows cast by the evening sun grew longer every day, until - by the end of October - the sun was too low and hidden behind the neighbouring buildings.

In response to the changing light, I have developed a different shape for this space that revolves around the column in the middle of the room while checking the course of the sun and its coordinates:

www.timeanddate.com/sun/uk/

More images of wandering light

Threshold

'Threshold', a site-specific drawing, nylon and mohair-wool, photo: Harlan Whittingham


Early evening sun illuminating a detail of 'Threshold'
photo: Michael Taylor

Intermezzo

"wedding gespinst" 2 Tage Wedding", 6. - 8. September 2019
Montagehalle-Berlin und Atelier Togo 80, Berlin



Playful cooperative and interactive window display at Montagehalle-Berlin.
Fluorescent mohair wool and nylon

Vacant space

Blogposts April - July 2019 about work in an empty shop unit in Hull, made available by Axisweb. I'm using this space as a temporary studio to experiment and try out new avenues - mainly setting up site-specific installations.

More about this project in my interview with Axisweb.

Vacant Space, nylon thread and mohair wool

 unit47.blogspot.com

Globe's sister

A dream come true: Globe's sister so to speak - but while the former has been screen-printed, Blue Moon is cyanotyped: white silk-threads have been dyed with a photosensitive solution and exposed to sunlight. In other words - the sphere has been 'blue-printed' into a body of white silk-threads that are sewn to two acrylic glasses.
Depending on lighting the blue varies from royal blue to a dark cyan.
Thus, this was - and is - a photo challenge too.



Details


silk-thread, acrylic glass, weights (sash window)
33cm x 33cm x 82cm (109cm including weights)
Read more about the process here.
see also Themes / Process (May- September 2017)

Book with no pages

Book with No Pages (study)
bookwork (threaded)
materials: cardboard, silk thread
18 x 18 x 18cm

Two identical pieces of cardboard form the jacket of this book work. Stitched into the jacket are a square and a circle with the same area. When opening the 'book', a threaded drawing unfolds joining  a square and a circle. Squaring the circle the content of this book unites two incompatible concepts.

Link to more versions of 'Books with No Pages'

Hatched

Hatched has been commissioned by Amy Johnson Festival for their exhibition 'Da Vinci Engineered, Renaissance Mechanics to Contemporary Art'.
On display 2 July to 21 August 2016 @ Zebedee's Yard, off Whitefriargate, Hull
link to catalogue


A two-dimensional drawing 'hatches' into the third dimension: A stylized pair of wings is drawn/stitched on a horizontally suspended sheet of acrylic glass using black waxed thread. This 'drawing' builds the matrix for a bundle of invisible threads joining two acrylic sheets above our heads. Sewn to the vertical threads, a three-dimensional pair of wings (mohair) unfolds.

The fleeting shadow of the wings - it fluctuates with the light and weather outside - works as the counterpart of the steel weight at the bottom of the installation.  

2-D 'hatches' into 3-D; Plato's Allegory of the Cave comes to mind.



The base - acrylic glass sewn with nylon and waxed braided thread, steel plate (weight)



Mohair stitched to a matrix of nylon threads.

dimensions: 150cm x 40cm x 295cm (w x d x h)
materials: acrylic glass, nylon, waxed braided thread, mohair, steel plate

Pictures of an exhibition

'Changing Landscapes' a solo show of sculptures and installations
KunstRaumRhein | Dornach | Switzerland
18 Sept to 21 Nov 2015

Link to a photo album [press info button in top right corner to see annotations]

LEICHT

Latest addition to a series called AUSLOTEN (to fathom out). Part of a family of eight 3-D drawings on display at  Changing Landscapes, a solo-show at KunstRaumRhein in Dornach, near Basel, Switzerland.


Light and nylon threads

Dimensions: 12 x 36 x 200 cm
nylon thread | light (LED) | acrylic glass | weight (metal)

the other side

Inner space (as in last post), different lighting, different view.

Inner space

Some of what happened in the studio over the last couple of weeks. The fibres form a sphere with an open segment.
Initial pics taken at dusk in the studio.

Materials: unspun wool / nylon thread / acrylic glass
Dimensions (cm): 44 x 44 x 210

Un rien

un rien: a touch, a shade, a tiny bit
rien: nothing, (in questions) anything(!)

It is hard to capture the subtleness of this piece, light and the third dimension - or your own motion around the object - are soo vital. Yet here are some pics - click thumbs.

115mm x 183mm x 150cm
Nylon, wool, acrylic glass

Echo (learning to fly)

Drawing of a winged shape and its dotted mirror image (studio pics). Currently shown at Cupola gallery in Sheffield together with some ink drawings until 10 January 2015.

materials: fine wool thread, nylon, acrylic glass
dimensions: 150cm x 12.5cm x 18.5cm (h x d x w)

Cell

Another 'drawing' in white, Cell, a 'ball' hovering in mid-air, slightly curling up and sliced on one side. 19cm wide. Find more images in this album.

Trilogy

Three of five pieces displayed in Berlin on the occasion of a studio event/show 22 - 25 May 2014 with Marion Ehrsam, Sibylle Hoessler and Montagehalle.

Click thumbs - and find more images on face-book.

• 'Thoughts fly' - letters drawn in 2-D are the base for words spelled in mid-air.
• 'Waves' - letters stitched in the base become a 3-D drawing of undulating lines.
• 'Oscillator' - a zigzag line in 2-D is the base for two lines spiralling in 3-D. (Sold)

Altogether these three work as a trilogy: denken - fühlen - wollen | thinking - feeling - willing.