Friday, November 11, 2022

BEAUTY: Light Art--Tim Etchell

Light artist Tim Etchell has been making some wonderful pieces for public spaces over the last several years.

His website observes, "Etchells’ neon and LED pieces often draw on his broader fascinations as an artist, writer and performance maker, exploring contradictory aspects of language – the speed, clarity and vividness with which it communicates narrative, image and ideas, and at the same time its amazing propensity to create a rich field of uncertainty and ambiguity.

Through simple phrases spelt out in neon, LED and other media, Etchells strives to create miniature narratives, moments of confusion, awkwardness, reflection and intimacy in public and gallery settings. Encountering the neon sign works, in the streets of a city or in the space of a white cube gallery, the viewer becomes implicated in a situation that’s not fully revealed, or a linguistic formulation that generates confusion or ambiguity. As often in Etchells’ work, in the neons the missing parts of the picture are as important as the elements that are present. Invoking a story, or projecting an idea out-of-context, the work invites us in, but into what exactly we can’t be sure."

Indeed, these pieces are poignant, thought-provoking, and direct the viewer to a place of self-reflection where one is encouraged to ponder one's place in the world and our journey through time here on this planet. Like poetry, it is the brevity of these pieces that leaves room for such thoughts.


https://timetchells.com/

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