UNDER CONSTRUCTION WORKS ON PAPER

Home » Multimedia Artwork » Under Construction//在建设中 2003-2015 » UNDER CONSTRUCTION WORKS ON PAPER

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Walter Benjamin, a German Jewish philosopher, purchased a drawing of Paul Klee’s called “Angelus Novus” (the angel of history). Benjamin lived through the first world war and took his life during the Second, shortly after being arrested for attempted escape from France. Before he died, he wrote about what he called “a storm from Paradise.” He said, “[The Angel of History’s] face is turned to the past. Where we perceive a chain of events, he sees one catastrophe that keeps piling ruin upon ruin…. The angel would like to stay, awaken the dead, and make whole what has been smashed. But a storm has been blowing from Paradise. It has got caught in his wings with such violence that he can no longer close them. The storm irresistibly propels him into the future to which his back is turned, while the pile of debris before him grows skyward. This storm is what we call progress.”

This series of drawings continues the exploration of the process of building–somewhat following the stages of foundation, infrastructure, superficies, etc. – with some sort of interior weight structure which can then be swathed in veils of transparent color.  Moving and shifting, the buildings are sometimes awkward, defying physical law. As imaginary portraits of construction, the goal is not to finish a shiny high-rise or an activity filled skyscraper, but to find some moment of resolution in the creation process.

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