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photos / Bruce Connew, 2018
photos / CG, 2018
pattern for the brass back / CG 2017
wind load calculations / Compusoft Engineering, 2018
»Light Weight O« : drawings, Catherine Griffiths, 2017
photos / David Straight, 2018
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A note on the artwork
»Light Weight O« is a mirror-faced, brass-backed object suspended above O’Connell Street in downtown Auckland, Aotearoa New Zealand.
The title of the work riffs off reflection, suspension and typography through materiality, movement and proportion, making a direct nod to the light weight version of a letter-form (see also A Hillside Intervention), and as part of an ongoing series of vowel works in public and private spaces (see list of works).
The 2.4m circular object gently pivots, offering its natural and built surroundings back to the viewer through light and reflection, catching the eye close-up and at a distance.
As in other works such as AEIOU and Constructed/Projected, the viewer is encouraged to observe the above and the below, and consider the space between. It brings to attention the sky, framed by the built environment, and the earth beneath. That the letter ‘O’ happens to be the first of the street’s name is incidental.
The materality of brass is expected to take on the atmospheric conditions and dull off with a shift in tone and colour. The occasional act of polishing the brass back to a glimmer is intended as a performative extension of the artwork, inserted under the guise of a regular maintenance programme.
On June 27, 2018, almost six years since winning the call by the Auckland Council Public Art Team for a light-based work as part of the re-configuration of the street into a shared space, »Light Weight O« was finally realised as form in space.
The original proposal (2012) presented five vowels as a sequence of abstracted forms, the length of the street. Short-listed to two, the focus became the intersection where Vulcan Lane meets O’Connell Street. The drawings below show »Light Weight« as proposed in 2012, with a re-focus of location and refinement of the proposal which won the call. However, as it turned out, the location was not so easily settled on. After several years of keeping the project alive, and a stirling effort by the team to find a willing partnership between two buildings, the object finally found its space between Nos 5 and 10 O’Connell Street.
CG / June 2018
My thanks to all who have been involved — Auckland Council Public Art Team, Alert Glass, Compusoft Engineering, Concrete Structure Investigations, Design Production, Rich Rigging, No.5 and No.10 O’Connell Street, friends and whānau.
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original proposal re-focused, drawings / Catherine Griffiths, 2012
photo / Shabnam Shiwan, 2018
photo / David Straight, 2018
other works >>
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01 typography in the landscape
Light Weight O
O’Connell Street, Auckland, NZ
2012 / installed 2018
Kihi/Kiss
Wellington Airport domestic terminal, NZ
2015 / installation tba
Collidescape
Te Kei, Ara Institute of Canterbury, Christchurch, NZ
2016
Zion Hill Park
Auckland, NZ
2014 construction 2015/16
Fifth Movement
Takapuna Beach House, NZ
2012
The Trestle Leg Series
Auckland Harbour Bridge, NZ
2012
A Hillside Intervention Athfield Architects, Wellington, NZ
2011/12
AEIOU
A typo/sound sculpture, Wellington, NZ
2009
Wellington
Writers Walk
A series of 15 concrete text sculptures, Wellington, NZ
2002 and 2004
Ponatahi House
A house wrapped in literature, Wairarapa, NZ
2003
Distance Markers
A series of cast-iron, number discs, Wellington, NZ
2004
Light Weight O
2012– / 2018 installed
client: Auckland Council Public Art Team
New Zealand
»Light Weight O« is a mirror-faced, brass-backed object suspended above O’Connell Street in downtown Auckland, Aotearoa New Zealand.
The title of the work riffs off reflection, suspension and typography through materiality, movement and proportion, making a direct nod to the light weight version of a letterform and as part of an ongoing series of vowel works in public and private spaces.
The 2.4m circular object gently pivots, offering its natural and built surroundings back to the viewer through light and reflection, catching the eye close-up, and at a distance.
As in other works, the viewer is encouraged to observe the above and the below, and consider the space between. It brings to attention the sky, framed by the built environment, and the earth beneath.
<< more on the work, see below, with installation photos to come soon >>
2.4m x 96mm, mirror, brass, stainless steel
related
links
AEIOU
Sound Tracks
Fifth Movement
Constructed/Projected
Collidescape
Kihi/Kiss
articles
Inner City Modality
Writing by Types
Body, Mind, Somehow: the Text Art of Catherine Griffiths (ArtNZ issue #150
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