Eclipse
8'x16'x55'
aluminum, paint, steel, epoxy
1/00
$19,400 commission; Moore Regional Hospital Auxiliary
Moore Regional Hospital Outpatient Lobby; Pinehurst, NC
(see statement below)
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My starting point in creating a mobile for
the lobby of the Outpatient Facility at Moore Regional Hospital
was a careful study of the architectural characteristics of
the room. The length and height of the room were obvious considerations.
The strong lines of the columns and beams also seemed to call
for some response in the mobile. I allowed those characteristics
to guide my design choices.
To maximize visibility from all parts of
the room, I divided the mobile into four main sections, with
one hanging from each of the four beams. This arrangement
allowed the moving pieces in adjacent sections to overlap
in their rotations, which lead to the central design feature
of the mobile--the near touching of adjacent pieces. There
are more than a dozen points where the pieces can come within
two inches of each other.
While developing the large-scale forms and
movements of the mobile, I simultaneously explored design
options for the individual pieces of the mobile, settling
on circular forms--disks, hoops, crescents, and spheres--as
a unifying design element. In considering various ways for
adjacent pieces to nearly touch as they passed, I realized
that some pieces could, in effect, pass through others if
I cut out sections from some of the disks. Each cutout is
like a shadow of the disk or sphere that occasionally passes
through that space--thus the title, Eclipse.
The stationary red spheres add a layer of
complexity to the design in their contrast to the moving parts.
The arc created by the spheres cuts right through the space
occupied by the moving pieces, yet none of them collide. Visually
tracing the path of the spheres across the room is somewhat
like seeing a series of time-elapsed photographs. The five
spheres can be seen as a single object at different points
in its trajectory. It could be a comet whooshing through space
or a planet held in its curved path by some distant star.
In my aspiration to make the mobile interesting
from all viewpoints--including looking directly up--I became
intrigued with the visual effects of screens. I experimented
with many variations and settled on the closely spaced rods
that span the hoop ends. I enjoy the subtle vibrations or
moiré patterns that are created as one screen passes
in front of another screen.
Eclipse is constructed primarily of aluminum.
The spheres were bent by hand from various sizes of aluminum
tubing. This mobile was more difficult to balance than any
mobile which I had previously made due to the numerous points
of near contact between pieces. In many places, if a piece
were hung an inch higher or lower, or if the balance point
were offset by a couple of inches, it would collide with another
piece.
While the design suggests somewhat of a planetary
theme in its circular orbits, sense of gravitational pull,
and eclipsed disks, the design is ultimately more visual than
conceptual. Many interpretations are possible. In any case,
I hope that viewers will find pleasure in the gentle movements,
diverse visual patterns, and bright colors of this continually
changing sculpture.
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