Central Campus Beautification(?) Project

I started off this project with a completely open mind, trying to see what I liked and didn't like about the different properties of the can.  I knew I didn't want to create something with concrete imagery - I wanted it to be appealing to the eye and fairly abstract.

I started to work with the material and was taken by the interior, non-colored, part of the can.  The material reminded me of a Frank Gehry building -

 Walt Disney Opera House, Guggenheim Bilbao, etc... so I took off brainstorming on that path. 

Guggenheim 

Bilbao

 I tried to think of ways I could create larger sheets of aluminum panels with I could then shape, warp, distort to create something on a large scale.  With wire being our only way to connect cans, I couldn't think of a realistic way to do this (although Maya's seemed to have a lot of success sewing her skirt).

I moved on thinking of other ways to use the inside of the can.  I decided I would cut the aluminum into strips and connect them in long straight strips, which would connect what used to be the can's top and bottom.  I worked on this 'deconstructed can' idea for awhile, cutting large amounts of aluminum strips and compiling various tops and bottoms.  

When I started to wire the strips together, I realized the wire didn't want to stay straight (but curled up on itself, got various bends), which was essential to what I had planned.  Rather than meticulously trying to straighten each piece, I decided I would intentionally curve each piece and scratch yet another plan.

I worked through all the strips I had and created a lot of curved wire pieces, strung with aluminum strips, all of various lengths.  I wanted to hang them from rings of higher gauge wire, and in the process of hanging them found I could make multiple sculptures.  Looking out my window on Central Campus, I thought it would look neat if I hung all the sculptures in one place, making sure anyone who was around it would notice.

I made about 8 sculptures and hung them all in the same green space in Central, from various tree limbs, stair wells, and broken lights.  I thought Central was the best choice simply because it is so ugly and neglected, and I figured no one would ever take them down.

You can see 4 scluptures in this picture

You can see 5 sculptures in this picture

A friend, helping me hang one of the pieces.

I tried to capture people's reaction to them, but most people walked by with no reaction at all.  When I asked friends what they thought of it, they thoug

ht it was really cool and I found that most people that got close to it really like to touch the various curls.

My friend Mike looking at the different pieces.

If you are ever on Central feel free to take a look, because I'm guessing Duke's never going to take them down.