Gravity
Monumental spatial installation · 2019
- ArtistDavid Spriggs
- Date2019
- Dimensions3.2 × 4 × 3.2 m
125 × 158 × 125 in - MaterialsPainted layered transparencies and framework
- ExhibitionLost in Play II
- LocationEast Bund Mingsheng Art Wharf, Shanghai, China
A luminous vortex occupies the gallery as an event without fixed boundary.
Gravity gathers painted fragments around a dark axis, making an invisible force perceptible through the movement it produces. From the principal viewpoint, dispersed marks coalesce into a turbulent volume. The centre appears to pull the surrounding image inward while the form continues to expand into the room.
The work stages a tension between pictured depth and actual depth. Its apparent body is constructed across a physical interval, yet remains dependent upon alignment. When the viewer steps aside, the vortex separates into sheets and the image gives way to its spatial structure.
The absent centre
The work is organised by what it withholds. Its dark axis is not a represented object but a void around which every visible element turns. Absence becomes structural, giving the surrounding fragments direction and coherence.
Gravity is phenomenological in a precise sense: its form arises through the body’s changing relation to it. No single viewpoint contains the work. Perception must join successive views into an understanding that remains provisional and embodied.
Gravity was presented in Lost in Play II at East Bund Mingsheng Art Wharf, Shanghai, from 28 April to 7 May 2019.