Do you have a minute? Erwin Wurm debuts a new series of short-lived sculptures
![An art design photography of office space.](https://cdn.mos.cms.futurecdn.net/wvnMZG7k5ZeoUbEyc3HAif-415-80.jpg)
In conjunction with the Austrian artist Erwin Wurm’s 20th anniversary of his one-minute sculptures - for which he is best known - New York’s Lehmann Maupin gallery is showing ’Ethics demonstrated in geometrical order’, displaying Wurm’s newest one-minute series and five new sculptures.
’The one-minute sculptures have changed a lot over the years since the first show I did in 1997,’ says Wurm. ’At first I tried playing around with the idea of sculptures who had a short existence, then it was me interacting with them, and later I thought it would be interesting to involve the public.’ The one-minute sculptures will also be presented at this year’s Venice Biennale.
The basic premise stays consistent. For each work, Wurm presents an object and creates a drawing and specific text inscribed on that object to instruct the user how to pose with it for one minute. The resulting awkward contortions are humorous, but the interaction contains deeper meanings. ’It’s related to issues of science, philosophy, psychology and explores ideas of free will and authorship,’ Wurm says. ’For a while, I used to make the drawing inviting the pubic to follow my instructions, then I would take a Polaroid photo and would offer to sign it for them, so it became an interplay of who was the author of the finished result. Then the iPhone came along and selfies happened and people were making one-minute sculptures on their own.’
'Organisation of Love', 2016, by Erwin Wurm as part of One Minute Sculptures
For this show, Wurm selected midcentury modern furnishings due to their current popularity. ’Furniture is something I’ve always found particularly intriguing because at the beginning everyone thinks something is unique, but then it becomes part of mass taste. People try to illustrate themselves and their lives through their furnishings,’ he explains. Throughout his work, Wurm plays with our common perception of how everyday items should be experienced, from household objects and furniture, to cars and buildings.
Wurm also presents partially melted sculptures of two New York landmarks, the Equitable building and the Flat Iron building in addition to seemingly random objects like a bag of clay and pickles. All of the sculptures distort the item, either by giving it an inflated, fat look, or as Wurm describes the melting process, ’double-destoys it.’ By changing the forms in these ways, Wurm believes he also changes the larger context and meaning of the object itself, even if that new meaning is unique to each viewer.
Left, Salatgurke Modernistisch, 2016. Right, Flat Iron, 2016
Left, Spaceship to Venus, 2016. Right, Deep Snow, 2016
INFORMATION
’Ethics demonstrated in geometrical order’ will be on view through 26 May. For more information, visit Lehmann Maupin’s website
Wallpaper* Newsletter + Free Download
For a free digital copy of August Wallpaper*, celebrating Creative America, sign up today to receive our daily digest of inspiration, escapism and design stories
ADDRESS
536 West 22nd Street
New York, NY, 10011
Pei-Ru Keh is a former US Editor at Wallpaper*. Born and raised in Singapore, she has been a New Yorker since 2013. Pei-Ru held various titles at Wallpaper* between 2007 and 2023. She reports on design, tech, art, architecture, fashion, beauty and lifestyle happenings in the United States, both in print and digitally. Pei-Ru took a key role in championing diversity and representation within Wallpaper's content pillars, actively seeking out stories that reflect a wide range of perspectives. She lives in Brooklyn with her husband and two children, and is currently learning how to drive.
-
Phaidon’s new Graphic Classics is a lavish greatest hits of graphic design
Graphic Classics is a compendium of seven centuries of visual culture, from the everyday and ephemeral to visionary works that reshaped our world
By Jonathan Bell Published
-
Birley Chocolate hits the sweet ’n’ chic spot in London’s Chelsea
The new Birley Chocolate shop, a sibling to Birley Bakery, is a confection of colour as delicious as its finely crafted goods
By Melina Keays Published
-
Feel at home at Auberge, Château La Coste's new inn for culture lovers
Auberge La Coste sits at the heart of the art-filled estate, minutes away from the joyful town of Aix-en-Provence
By Harriet Thorpe Published
-
‘Mental health, motherhood and class’: Hannah Perry’s dynamic installation at Baltic
Hannah Perry's exhibition ’Manual Labour’ is on show at Baltic in Gateshead, UK, a five-part installation drawing parallels between motherhood and factory work
By Emily Steer Published
-
Francis Alÿs plots child play around the world at the Barbican
In Francis Alÿs' exhibition ‘Ricochets’ at London’s Barbican, the artist explores the universality of play, even in challenging situations
By Amah-Rose Abrams Published
-
At Glastonbury’s Shangri-La, activism and innovation meet
Glastonbury’s south-east corner is known for its after-dark entertainment but by day, there is a different story to tell
By Rhian Daly Published
-
‘I am almost an anti-sculptor’: Dominique White on her Whitechapel Max Mara Art Prize show
The artist mines the ocean to explore Afrofuturism in ‘Deadweight’, opening at London’s Whitechapel and detailed in a new film
By Amah-Rose Abrams Published
-
Remembering Rusty Egan's Blitz Club: a place to 'avoid the mob and the homophobes', where the New Romantics were born
As he releases new vinyl boxset, 'Blitzed!', Wallpaper* meets DJ Rusty Egan to talk about London's scene-building Blitz club – the antidote to the late 70s punk scene and a hot-bed of experimental fashion
By Craig McLean Published
-
Suzannah Pettigrew's 'tender and ghostly' new show at Surrealist photographer Lee Miller's former home in East Sussex
London-based artist Suzannah Pettigrew's photographic stills create a snapshot of her Sussex coast childhood, conjuring up a hallucinatory world of memory
By Mary Cleary Published
-
The body, pleasure and play: Beryl Cook and Tom of Finland united in London
Tom of Finland’s homoeroticism meets Beryl Cook’s female-oriented camp as Studio Voltaire unites work by the two artists in a London exhibition
By Hannah Silver Published
-
Harlem-born artist Tschabalala Self’s colourful ode to the landscape of her childhood
Tschabalala Self’s new show at Finland's Espoo Museum of Modern Art evokes memories of her upbringing, in vibrant multi-dimensional vignettes
By Millen Brown-Ewens Published