I’m Sarah Sze
I’m an artist
This is a piece that I actually made for the
Carnegie International in 1999 in Pittsburgh
And it was put into storage for 19 years
And it’s just come out of storage and been
reinstalled for the first time since then
I have a background in architecture and in
painting so this work actually is this kind
of interesting marriage of the two
So you see painting and architecture coming
together to make a sculpture
So a lot of the decisions are very painterly
decisions
The composition is a play between a very structured
kind of composing and movement of something
like the brushstroke thrown across a room
The objects are the same objects from 1999
and I think actually part of the idea was
also that they would be objects that somehow
in their extremely practical use were sort
of already perfected and might not change
Technology is totally the opposite
If these were cameras from 1999 they’d be
unusable
The idea of using hardware tools is an interesting
idea because this idea that all of the tools
to make the piece then become the piece
That the work that a sculpture is a kind of
tool for understanding space and time and
then the tools, almost like a kit, like everything
you need to make the piece is actually in
the piece itself
And there’s again, there’s a blurring
of the seam between what’s a tool to make
things with or to use in a practical way and
what’s an aesthetic tool
How do we use things aesthetically to understand
the world or to make things?
So you find things like ladders or you see
the electricity
You see all of the actual tools that you might
need, let’s say, to remake this piece
Also it’s interesting in this piece I realised
reinstalling it, is the idea of the archive
and how you sort of mark time through objects
So there are things in the piece that if you
spend time with it you can see it was made
in 1999
And there are things I’ve added that actually
inform that it was reinstalled at this date
So that this idea of a kind of collection
of objects that actually define or become
a portrait of the behaviour of the time
There’s some evidence of it right here in
a very archival way
So there’s actually the ID card from 1999
is in the piece and I’ve added actually
the Tate ID card as well
So there’s a 1999 receipt up in this part
of the piece and then there’s a receipt
from today
So in this space you can see here the backroom
where the wall
So this is where you would never see if you
were coming to the museum
But now with this piece it’s revealed that
behind the museum walls there are all of,
and they’re incredible things
There are all of these small spaces, these
kind of in-between spaces, that help create
the experience of the museum as a seamless
space
This is what the seams look like
So through these windows you get these sort
of glimpses back here into this world and
enough so that you understand but you don’t
know the full
So that puts you into the realm of the imagination
That you start to imagine what the possibilities
of the building are behind the wall
How do you make something that’s not live
feel live?
How do you make a work that feels almost like
an echo system?
That can be in the composition
That can be in the choice of materials
That you feel like the materials are actually
active
This has this thrust that starts this movement
that it moves very quickly and then it generates
and collects and slows down in a kind of organic
way
And having a humidifier, having a fan, having
lights in this piece so actually this idea
of the air, the water, the light is all part
of the piece itself
But I think what’s nice about this piece
is how do you take the mundanity of a space
and the mundanity of things we know like a
wall or like, a common light or a common plant
and put them in a situation where they transcend
where they are
