GRAVITY & GRACE ⭐GYM-HYMN☆
2024
Gravity & Grace, Gym Hymn is a dream space: an ode to bodybuilding and the communal pursuit of beauty, strength and transcendence within the gym. Drawing on Simone Weil and Émile Durkheim, the work considers the gym as a site of collective ritual and discipline, an exalted atmosphere where gravity and grace converge.
Within this world, eccentric and exaggerated forms challenge conventional ideas of beauty, moving between the grand and the vulnerable, the physical and the transcendent.
The installation draws on my morning gym ritual, the distinct energy of gym culture and the dazzling spectacle of bodybuilding tournaments. Here, bodybuilding becomes a monumental performance in an elevated reality. Fanciful equipment and sculptural objects materialise qualities of strength, grace and sensory intensity, creating an immersive Gym Hymn aesthetic.
Central to the work is the tension explored in Weil’s Gravity and Grace: gravity as the weight of the material world, and grace as the possibility of transcendence. The bodybuilder is bound by the body's material limits, yet through discipline, repetition and attention to form, grace emerges.
Materials: Fine silver, Pearls, Wood, Spray paint, Glitter, Titanium, Anodised Tinium, Steel, (mild and blackened), Hand-blown glass, Fabrics (e.g., chiffon, cotton), Embriodery, Silicones, Found objects, (various metals, other materials) CNC-ed Silicone upholstered Synthetic Objects, Rubber, (e.g., polystyrene) Lumi lightboxes, Fine art prints. NORLA DOME measures 17m in diameter.
2024
Gravity & Grace, Gym Hymn is a dream space: an ode to bodybuilding and the communal pursuit of beauty, strength and transcendence within the gym. Drawing on Simone Weil and Émile Durkheim, the work considers the gym as a site of collective ritual and discipline, an exalted atmosphere where gravity and grace converge.
Within this world, eccentric and exaggerated forms challenge conventional ideas of beauty, moving between the grand and the vulnerable, the physical and the transcendent.
The installation draws on my morning gym ritual, the distinct energy of gym culture and the dazzling spectacle of bodybuilding tournaments. Here, bodybuilding becomes a monumental performance in an elevated reality. Fanciful equipment and sculptural objects materialise qualities of strength, grace and sensory intensity, creating an immersive Gym Hymn aesthetic.
Central to the work is the tension explored in Weil’s Gravity and Grace: gravity as the weight of the material world, and grace as the possibility of transcendence. The bodybuilder is bound by the body's material limits, yet through discipline, repetition and attention to form, grace emerges.
Materials: Fine silver, Pearls, Wood, Spray paint, Glitter, Titanium, Anodised Tinium, Steel, (mild and blackened), Hand-blown glass, Fabrics (e.g., chiffon, cotton), Embriodery, Silicones, Found objects, (various metals, other materials) CNC-ed Silicone upholstered Synthetic Objects, Rubber, (e.g., polystyrene) Lumi lightboxes, Fine art prints. NORLA DOME measures 17m in diameter.
11:00 27|11|2024 - 01|12|2024
MISSION TO SEAFARERS (NORLA DOME)
717 Flinders Street, Docklands
Naarm/Melbourne
VIC 3000
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MISSION TO SEAFARERS (NORLA DOME)
717 Flinders Street, Docklands
Naarm/Melbourne
VIC 3000
Images courtesy:Leanna Maione Photography 🩵