APATHY FOR THE SETTING SUN. 2011
1x 1 x 2.m (LxWxH)
Edition of 3
Cast plastic unions, gradient vinyl, sep-down transformer and fluorescent lights
APATHY FOR THE SETTING SUN, 2011 – refers to the idea that the sun sets over a thousand times a day all over the world. Begging the question whether this nostalgic moment, this constant state of setting could have any significance. This artificial sun represents the centre, the protector, the provider of warmth and life, while simultaneously expressing the latent explosive danger inherent in the technological and eternal hydrogen bomb.
1x 1 x 2.m (LxWxH)
Edition of 3
Cast plastic unions, gradient vinyl, sep-down transformer and fluorescent lights
APATHY FOR THE SETTING SUN, 2011 – refers to the idea that the sun sets over a thousand times a day all over the world. Begging the question whether this nostalgic moment, this constant state of setting could have any significance. This artificial sun represents the centre, the protector, the provider of warmth and life, while simultaneously expressing the latent explosive danger inherent in the technological and eternal hydrogen bomb.
The exhibition APATHY FOR THE SETTING SUN is a collection of new works created by artist Joshua Webb during his time at the Rhode Island School of Design (USA) and whilst living in New York city. The title of the show refers to the notion that if the sun sets over a thousand times in a single day all over the world, how and why does this romanticized and deceitfully nostalgic moment have any significance. Collectively these works embody a sense of the Heideggerian poiesis paradigm as form, provoking an alternative model of finality to construct sculptural and filmic containers that nonchalantly provoke a radical dialogue with the devil as they court an alternative model of finality.
The Angel of History . 2010
35x35x70 cm(LxWxH)
Edition of 3 (hydro-cal / white)
Edition of 3 (concrete / grey)
Bronze POA
Karl Marx’ severed head – White hemihydrate, based stone and concrete.
An angel is depicted there who looks as though he were about to distance himself from something, which he is staring at. His eyes are opened wide, his mouth stands open and his wings are outstretched. The Angel of History must look just so. His face is turned towards the past. Where we see the appearance of a chain of events, he sees one single catastrophe, which unceasingly piles rubble on top of rubble and hurls it before his feet.He would like to pause for a moment so fair, to awaken the dead and to piece together what has been smashed. But a storm is blowing from Paradise; it has caught itself up in his wings and is so strong that the Angel can no longer close them. The storm drives him irresistibly into the future, to which his back is turned, while the rubble-heap before him grows sky-high. That which we call progress, is this storm.
Walter Benjamin 1940. Theses on the Philosophy of History
35x35x70 cm(LxWxH)
Edition of 3 (hydro-cal / white)
Edition of 3 (concrete / grey)
Bronze POA
Karl Marx’ severed head – White hemihydrate, based stone and concrete.
An angel is depicted there who looks as though he were about to distance himself from something, which he is staring at. His eyes are opened wide, his mouth stands open and his wings are outstretched. The Angel of History must look just so. His face is turned towards the past. Where we see the appearance of a chain of events, he sees one single catastrophe, which unceasingly piles rubble on top of rubble and hurls it before his feet.He would like to pause for a moment so fair, to awaken the dead and to piece together what has been smashed. But a storm is blowing from Paradise; it has caught itself up in his wings and is so strong that the Angel can no longer close them. The storm drives him irresistibly into the future, to which his back is turned, while the rubble-heap before him grows sky-high. That which we call progress, is this storm.
Walter Benjamin 1940. Theses on the Philosophy of History
THE LAW OF DIMINISHING RETURNS. 2010
30x30x85 cm (LxWxH)
Stonecast / carved books and concrete
As the revolution is fixed to its axis, the return of the market is eminent. The law of motion demands a diminishing cycle of revolutions, limited by the friction that acts upon the return. This Law of Diminishing Returns could be seen as the alchemic price of utopia: the dramatic consequence of the Soviet Union’s creating something (the Eutopia) from nothing (the void that was the radical break from history). For any alchemical equation, that which turns lead to gold, the pursuit of eternal life or even utopia must carry the overbearing, sometimes even apocalyptic, weight of its transaction. The price of impossible exchange is the Devil; one/we must not upset the natural order of things. For instance, consider that gold is the physical index against which all currency is measured. When the production cycle of alchemic gold exceeds its entropic equilibrium, the price of gold plummets and leads to a global economic crisis. Likewise, once the recipe for eternal life goes public, the upward curve of population will demand resources in excess of our planet’s supply; the result being an endless existence within a realized hell on earth. The alchemic price of Communism’s Eutopia was its eventual disappearance as Otherness within a totalizing market system.
30x30x85 cm (LxWxH)
Stonecast / carved books and concrete
As the revolution is fixed to its axis, the return of the market is eminent. The law of motion demands a diminishing cycle of revolutions, limited by the friction that acts upon the return. This Law of Diminishing Returns could be seen as the alchemic price of utopia: the dramatic consequence of the Soviet Union’s creating something (the Eutopia) from nothing (the void that was the radical break from history). For any alchemical equation, that which turns lead to gold, the pursuit of eternal life or even utopia must carry the overbearing, sometimes even apocalyptic, weight of its transaction. The price of impossible exchange is the Devil; one/we must not upset the natural order of things. For instance, consider that gold is the physical index against which all currency is measured. When the production cycle of alchemic gold exceeds its entropic equilibrium, the price of gold plummets and leads to a global economic crisis. Likewise, once the recipe for eternal life goes public, the upward curve of population will demand resources in excess of our planet’s supply; the result being an endless existence within a realized hell on earth. The alchemic price of Communism’s Eutopia was its eventual disappearance as Otherness within a totalizing market system.
THE MIRROR OF CAPITAL. 2010
1000x2000x12mm (LxWxH)
Laser cut mirrored acrylic.
Advanced computer simulation software was employed within the construction of this work to generate a mathematical representation of the exact shatter pattern that would occur if one were to throw a marble bust of Karl Marx ‘s severed head through a plate glass window.
1000x2000x12mm (LxWxH)
Laser cut mirrored acrylic.
Advanced computer simulation software was employed within the construction of this work to generate a mathematical representation of the exact shatter pattern that would occur if one were to throw a marble bust of Karl Marx ‘s severed head through a plate glass window.
http://www.galeriedusseldorf.com.au/GDArtists/WebbJosh/JW2011/JoshuaWebbExhGD2011/index.html
