BIRD AS SPACE (BRANCUSI)
Bird as Space - 24” x 8” x 6” - Inkjet double-sided rag photo paper and custom-made acrylic case.
Nelemans takes on a different kind of icon in his sculptural works, using as his starting point Constantin Brancusi’s Bird in Space (1923). He investigates how physical space is translated into RGB subpixels by scanning a computer screen that projects an image of Brancusi’s work and manipulating the output into a sculptural photographic print. Bird As Space suggests the desire to translate the closed-circuit into a physical object. Whereas Brancusi, inspired by Modernist principles, used vectors to suggest the freedom of the bird’s flight, Nelemans instead encloses the sculptural work within an acrylic box effectively caging the bird.
– Lisa Sutcliffe, Curator of Photography and Media Arts at the Milwaukee Art Museum.
