De toeschouwer (The spectator)
October 2017
Nomadic sculpture
(plaster, foam, steel, resin)
High above the busy streets, rushing cyclist, noisy traffic and passing trams, sits a figure on the rim of the city. From this position everything seems smaller, easier to oversee and less relevant. The seclusion is serene. The high buildings below are reduced to merely objects to sit on, from where he can watch the hurried scenes below. Here he has time to think and reflect. Every now and than he changes location, searching for his own position within the busy context down below him.
The work consist of plaster, resin and foam, stabilized by an iron construction within. For the duration of one month it was placed on the rood of Het Witte Huis in De Wijnhaven, Rotterdam. This building is one of the few in the centre that survived the bombing of 1940, and is considered to be the first skyscraper in Europe. The work questions the pace at which we live and the constructed reality we believe in.
The Spectator was part of The 9 lions of the Wijnhaven, of the Off Blaak project, a continuing project with many art manifestations around the Wijnhaven. Organised by artists Niek Verschoor and Milou van Ham and supported by CBK Rotterdam.
Click on this link to see a interview taken by the Open Rotterdam during the opening of the project. (Local Dutch tv and social media broadcast)
photographs: Maarten van der Wilt