Rift1 and 2 pursue a moment between balance and flight where the precise distribution of mass, form and space activate the sculpture. Inspired by observation of the natural marine world, it is intended to embody complexity, movement and a sense of thrust and violence - all reduced to their simplest elements.
The galvanised steel elements represents the force of the sea, a powerful flow of ocean currents. The weathered Corten elements symbolise sedentary marine animals - violently being torn from their fundament by the force of the current. The work explores the tension generated by environmental forces interacting with and reflected by the change in shape of these small invertebrate sea creatures.
An engineered square-section girder under end-to-end compression (the Z-shape) is reused to represent this elemental oceanic force. Simple triangular blocks of weathered steel are re-engineered into the physical components of the animals. A reductionist approach to understanding the nature of complex things by reducing them to elemental interactions between their fundamental constituents. |