Conrad Shawcross: Continuum
This exhibition has now closed.
Exhibition dates: 18 December 2004–6 February 2005
The National Maritime Museum (NMM) has commissioned young British artist Conrad Shawcross to make three new site-specific works as part of the Museum's ongoing New Visions contemporary art initiative.
Shawcross is best known for his intricate wooden, mechanical sculptures that mix historical, scientific, mythological and contemporary ideas about time and maritime exploration. The new works have been made specifically for the Queen’s House, England’s first Classical building, finished in 1638.
'Continuum' will consist of three new works, which have been created in response to the architecture and history of the Queen’s House, as well as two earlier pieces that further develop ideas of time and exploration.
The centrepiece of the exhibition is a large scale, site-specific work for the Great Hall of the House. Designed to echo the radiant geometry of the Inigo Jones floor where it sits, the work is the third in a series of looped systems in which the artist deals with human concepts of time. Conrad Shawcross explains:
From a distance the piece seems stationary, but closer-up it is clear that the wooden spring-like toroid structure, while not moving in any direction is moving through itself in perpetuity. Situated on the site of Greenwich Mean Time and divided into twelve giant wooden loops that join back on one another, the work can be seen as a conceptual model of the day.
The other new sculptures, 'Pre-retroscope II' and 'Pre-retroscope III', tell the story of two sea voyages undertaken by the artist, off the Cornish coast, in self-constructed wooden sea kayaks. The boats were built using instructions from a 1970s manual, and the artist has added a circular track system to enable him to make 360-degree film panoramas as he rows out to sea. When exhibited, the camera on the boat is replaced with a projector resulting in a rotating film re-telling the original journey.
An earlier work, 'Measurement and Control for the Infinite' (2002) also develops the theme of time. This wooden and glass object relates to the notion of the perfect measurement. In the Institute for Measurement and Control in London, the perfect metre is housed in an environmentally secure case so it does not expand and contract with temperature but, as a result, can never be used as a measure. In this piece Shawcross plays on some of the philosophical problems arising from having such an un-measurable control.
'The Winnowing Oar' (2003), completes the installation. It refers to a fictional object described in Homer’s Odyssey. Towards the end of Odysseus’s journey, he is told in a vision that he must take a well-cut oar from his ship and set off on foot, walking until he gets to a land that knows nothing of the sea and where people have no concept of the ocean. In this land he will be approached by a stranger who will mistake his oar for a winnowing fan. It is only then that his journey can end. This piece will be exhibited alongside the National Maritime Museum's historic paintings collection.
This exhibition is kindly supported by the Elephant Trust, the Arts Council of England and the Friends of the National Maritime Museum.
The artist
Recently named among The Observer's 80 most talented young people, Conrad Shawcross is best known for large, complex structures that fuse science with art. He won the First Base Acava Free Studio Award (2001) and the Ray Finnis Charitable Trust Award (2001) and has most recently exhibited at Saatchi Gallery (New Blood, 2004), Museum 52 (Dead Game, 2003), 14 Wharf Road (Fame and Promise, 2002), Camden Arts Centre (New Contemporaries, 2001). He is represented by the Victoria Miro Gallery. Conrad Shawcross will have solo exhibitions at the Walsall Art Gallery and Walker Art Gallery in 2005.