Timeline (D10)

This sculpture was conceived on a computer, realised into form by a process of laser cutting and then assembled by hand. The ramification of this process is that the scale and material of the form can be reconsidered and hence the sculpture’s relationship to space and viewer can be re-negotiated. Transforming digitally generated work into physical form can also produce a curious dialectic between transience and logic.

The two-dimensional figures that “inhabit” this particular work are sourced from images of South Africans and South African history. The overall sculptural form evolved out of references to contour maps, graphs and cardiograms, to create a hypothetical landscape.

In a sense this work is an ironic attempt to generate a layered timeline and a graphic representation of a populace and its history[ies]. Scale is pivotal, as the overall shape is large in relation to the viewer, yet the figures are tiny. In this regard the sculpture functions in the same manner as an architectural model, which, although being an object in itself, is a simulation of something larger and more complex.