IKEA Bewildered (2024)
Exhibiton
Exhibiton
Chaos’ Cradle is .zip’s new program series and testing site for artistic research, experimental presentations and other works-in-progress at the intersection of ecology and technology. The program includes events of all kind – from screenings and panel talks to exhibitions and performances – to offer an intimate and informal space for sharing feedback, finding community and exploring new collaborations.
Photos by Mihai Gui
Kinetic Sculpture
Medium: Steel, PVC, rubber, air compressor, mylar
Dimensions: 120cm x 40cm x 20cm
"Moment/um" unfolds as an air compressor breathes life into a plastic tube, setting off a choreography of unpredictable movements across its ground. In this kinetic work, the conduit becomes both the conductor and the canvas, responding to the force of compressed air in spontaneous and unpredictable rhythms. The interplay of chaos and environment gives rise to a living, ever-evolving artwork. Borrowing materials from industrial manufacturing, the sculpture further plays with the idea of the living mechanical where the forces of the natural world converge with the precision of human engineering. This constant state of flux asks us to consider the chaotic and the deliberate forces that shape our world.
“An air compressor squeezing air into a tube, as featured in Gill Baldwin’s (1992) kinetic sculpture Moment/um (2023), is not exactly what you would call human. But because of the writhing movements and unpredictable rhythm of the tube snaking across the floor, you can’t help feeling somewhat compassionate towards it. As if the air compressor has literally breathed life into the tube. Exactly that tension, between life and technology, is a recurring theme in Baldwin’s multidisciplinary work. She is interested in the relationship between humanity and technology and how it is subject to constant change. This raises the question whether human values and emotions will be compromised when technology and artificiality finally gain the upper hand. Who or what will eventually take control and therefore also seize power?” - Text by Esther Darley
Video documentation by Flora Resnik
Photography by Beeldsmits
Rolling Landscapes (2021)
Kinetic sculpture
Kinetic sculpture
Medium: Steel, chains, DC motor, natural grasses.
Dimensions: Various
When constructing the human-made nature reserve of Marker Wadden, 20,000 units of plants known as the common reed also known as the latin name Phragmites Australis were propagated into the sandy soil in order to stabilize the land. What does it mean to create nature?
In the sculpture Rolling Landscapes hundreds of Phragmites Australis are individually cut and placed into floral water tubes with violent precision reeds are forced into a performative rotation. The sculpture explores the tension between the plants' fragility, the desperate preservation to keep these plants alive, and the rough, raw, physical violence inherent in manufacturing these natural spaces.
Thank you to Wout Rockx for fabrication.
This project was co-produced by Gill Baldwin and V2_Lab for the Unstable Media as part of the Summer Sessions art and technology residencies.
Exhibited at Roodkapje as part of the solo exhibition BLISS
Exhibited at V2 Summer Sessions Test_labs 2021
Photography by Fenna de Jong
Water Fall (2021)
Kinetic sculpture
Kinetic sculpture
Medium: Steel, DC motor, pvc digital print on vinyl
Dimensions: 105cm x 175cm
A photograph from the popular stock photography website Unsplash is enhanced and printed to a 4 meter length, and rotated with a motion borrowed from street advertisements. Reflecting on the concept of nature as a reproduced set of images and re shared experiences, when a machine replicates the photographic qualities of nature, what is left?
Exhibited at Roodkapje as part of the solo exhibition BLISS
Thank you to Wout Rockx for workshop assistance.
*Photography by Beeldsmits
Impossible Bodies (2021)
Sculpture, Drawing, Painting
Sculpture, Drawing, Painting
Dimensions: Various
Since spring 2020, Gill Baldwin has been working on the ongoing series Impossible Bodies, making compositions of body parts taken from their context and reassembled in uncanny forms. While these forms are ever reminiscent of human body parts, they are designed in such a way that Google’s A.I. image recognition service Cloud Vision is incapable of recognising them as such. Continuing in fascination, Baldwin studies these impossible bodies in pencil, paint, sculpture, 3D-scans, and more recently, oil painting, as an exercise in translation and repetition. Similar to the process of saving digital files in different formats, she saves changes and edits continuously until something completely new arises.
*Text by Menno Vuister
