‘The Collection’, as both a concept and a
method is an idea influencing my sculpture.
The act of collecting in one sense derives
from the need to possess, to assemblage, and make sense of smaller,
separated,
disconnected pieces. Therefore a collection pulls together unrelated
objects to
create meaning or representation. I see every object as autonomous, but
then simultaneously
dependant on other objects for its definition. Each object may have its
individual
purpose, however, some objects we only perceive as having a function
when
grouped amongst other objects, or contained within a particular
context. For
example, what is a fork outside of the kitchen, without a knife, or
without
food? This object in our mind is limited to a particular function.
In a sense my attempt is to
‘recontextualise’ objects, and reform an object through a different
material to
perhaps be representational of an everyday object, or to force the
viewer to
look more closely at ‘ordinary things’ they usually might choose to not
pay
attention to. Each object has an aesthetic to be appreciated. That
‘aesthetic’ appreciation
perhaps is a product of cultural conditioning, like our belief in what
an
object is, or supposed to be used for. We can understand art as ‘art’,
when we
see it in a gallery; we understand a window as a window when it sits
into the
side of a wall. I am interested in the
form that is developed for a practical object, and how it was
developed, the
materials it is composed of, and the context in which we can appreciate
it.
These ideas are greatly influenced by the dada and surrealist movement, not in a stylistic sense, instead I am attracted to the idea of nonsense, but contradictorily in a serious way. I am interested in the things which have no functional purpose, and in a sense that’s what art is, an object of no practical use, if it is used practically we then call it craft. Marcel Duchamp and his ready-mades is an obvious influence here, he showed that a bicycle wheel does not become ‘art’ until in the context of a gallery and an autograph marked across it. In this sense what we call ‘art’ is highly trivial matter, and in a sense only tradition or fashion stands to mark what is considered art. These shapes slightly represent a type of dysfunctional machine, this interests me because if it doesn’t function, it has to be perceived as either art or rubbish.
Each of the four small individual pieces started by searching for similar shapes, some were squares, rectangles, rods, or sharp tapered pieces, this was my way of making sense of the box of scrap metal in front of me. The larger piece is a combination of all shapes; however it is still limited by the fact that they are all pieces of metal. Through my process, as I began collecting pieces and I became conscious of a particular guideline, theme, or taxonomy I was working with. I simply worked by collecting materials, the fact that a piece of metal is metal, differentiates it from a piece of marble, a simple concept, but why is it that we decide to group things of the same matter or shape together? The fact that these pieces are shown together allows for us to see the difference between them, and perhaps gain insight to a process. The idea of the collection could still be understood in the individual pieces, for there is a collection within each individual piece, but the process of the collection id evident when they are grouped. Perhaps I would like to suggest that there is a greater connection between the things that we so didactically categorize and separate for ourselves.
© heidi axelsen 2003