Stacked Car Sundial Proposal

Detroit

A proposal to the Citizens of Detroit.

Summary:

A sundial sculpture made of stacked automobiles.

Description:

A large sundial, the type most commonly seen in parks and gardens. The gnomon, the triangular device which casts the sun's shadow, consists of car wrecks stacked on top of each other, approximately 100 feet at its highest point. The dial encircling the gnomon will consist of a ring of automobiles, hald submerged. Individual cars will demarcate the hours of the day.

Site:

A park like setting of reclaimed urban decay anywhere in Detroit. The gnomon will rise out of
the water towards the southern shore of a man made lake.

Comment:

This sculpture is relevant to the people of Detroit for three reasons:

The monument's construction will help us consider the decay and (possible) regeneration of this
city and this land. The monument and site will mediate issues of history, aesthetics, recreation,
consumerism, as well as functional and dysfunctional characteristics of mass culture.
People of diverse backgrounds will be able to find meaning in it. It can help us reassess our
beliefs and values, stimulate the consideration of abstract ideas or simply communicate the local
solar time.
Automobiles have particular significance to Detroit and this monument considers the automobile
in an historical dimension. It stresses the temporary nature of any specific entity, such as an
automobile - or a neighborhood - yet suggests the significance of the automobile as our
particular obsession. The sculpture transforms functionless automobile wrecks into a functional,
celestial symbol of time.

needle's eye/INTERWOVEN PORTRAITS

Self Portrait: 'One Square Foot'

Oil on Canvas
12" x 12"
2007

For it is easier for a camel to go through a needle's eye, than for a rich man to enter into the kingdom of God.

St Luke, 18:25

This project will be an interrelated series of portraits in which the size of each individual portrait will be determined by the subject’s income or economic value.

I will depict people from different economic strata: rich, wealthy, middle class, poor, and destitute. The portraits will relate to each other through consistent application of contrast of extension. Contrast of extension is an elementary and fundamental design concept, it addresses contrast of size and scale. It entails the consideration of the overall size of an image as well as the balance of differently sized shapes and colours within an image.

For example, a portrait of a billionaire art collector, who has public art galleries named in his or her honour, will be massive in relation to the majority of relatively small, more conventionally sized, depictions of middle income patrons who frequent the gallery. Likewise, portraits of children on social assistance will be postage stamp sized. Following through with this visual logic an image of a beggar standing outside the gallery will be microscopic. Some portraits of beggars and children will require a microscope in order to be seen.

I’m starting this series with a self portrait. The size of this image is one square foot.

Crucible

Plan and side view of Humvee Kiln Hummer Planter	Crucible will be a sculpture/installation comprised of a functioning kiln and overhead emissions fan. The Raku kiln will be made in the form of a full scale Hummer which will appear to be half sunk in the floor – Cadillac-Ranch style – the front end of the vehicle rising up out of the ground. The overhead hood and fan will be designed to integrate with the surrounding architecture of the gallery. The metal body of the Hummer will be the kiln’s exoskeleton. The interior of the vehicle will be stripped, gutted and refitted with kiln bricks. Bricks will be visible through the front and side window cavities of the Hummer. The kiln will be approximately 12’ long, 7’ wide and 4’ high at its tallest (see page 2). I will fire Bush Dynasty Vases & Planters along with Consumer ware - ceramic casts of items found in personal vehicles - things like coffee mugs, umbrellas, books, coats, shoes, toys, sports equipment, weapons and groceries. After firing, the kiln will be emptied and the consumer ware placed around the Hummer to cool. The Hummer will be increasingly surrounded by bisqued and glazed consumer ware. There is the potential – given resources, time and energy - of ‘burying’ the Hummer/kiln in the consumer ware it produces. If possible I would like to make this sculpture/installation an interactive piece. Gallery patrons can be involved making casts of consumer ware, glazing the bisqued sculptures as well as helping load and unload the kiln. Like the Bush Dynasty Vases and Planters, some of the Consumer ware will be vessels for flowers and Ikebana. Ikebana is the Japanese Art of Flower Arrangement, a traditional art form developed from the Buddhist ritual of offering flowers to the dead. The practice is highly ritualized with many layers of symbolic and metaphysical meaning and is currently practiced worldwide by different schools of practitioners. Crucibles are symbols of severe trial and change. Hummers are luxury fetish objects, symbols of our consumerism and military. It is my intention to collide these symbols with historic aesthetic practices in order to arrive at an expression that embraces modern life (and mortality) along with humour and the inevitability of transformation.

Marcus Bowcott