Brilliant Ideas Episode #20: Conrad Shawcross

Conrad Shawcross is one of few British artists who received high-level education. Not like other art students, however, he was not interested in art-related elements such as art history or stories of famous artists, rather being fascinated by lectures on various subjects held in universities: the subject that had a grip on Shawcross was science.
The Nervous System(2003), which brought attention to him for the first time, is an installation piece in which a symmetrical loom-shaped structure is attached with a motor so that the axles of the loom are made to skew by about 30 degrees. Inspired by the “Luddite” that occurred during the Industrial Revolution era in Britain, this artwork shows slowly moving enormous structure that seems as if to fall down at any time, making the viewers feel like travelling back in time. Today, when everyone prefers small and fast machines, this anachronistic device exactly opposite thereto that included the artist’s intention to demonstrate the shape of time was appropriate to attract public attention.

One of the subjects that the artist, whose works are based on science and philosophy, particularly focuses on is “paradigm”. He has been interested in a paradigm since college years, making a series of works of which the title includes the word “paradigm” since 2006. One of his early works, Paradigm(Ode to the Difference Engine)(2006) is devoted to the basic concept of a paradigm that continuously changes rather than concentrating on artistic aesthetic, with two machines repeating the process of winding and unwinding a skein of thread. Further works of the Paradigm series has kept changing as their theme does, the material and size of the works gradually evolving in Paradigm Slender(2015), Paradigm Chamfer(2015), and Paradigm Exploded(2015). While Paradigm(Ode to the Difference Engine) was merely a machine that barely managed to operate, the further works had increasing artistic values while maintaining the concept of a paradigm.

As in the artist’s works famous for paying homage to scientists, this work is also based on Shawcross’ philosophy, inspired by The Structure of Scientific Revolutions by Thomas Kuhn, an American scientist and philosopher who suggested the concept of a paradigm for the first time, representing the content of the book that a new paradigm should keep tearing down an old paradigm for advance of science. Everything that keeps developing collapses one day and eventually comes to an end: the shape of Paradigm, in which weathered tetrahedrons are soaring to the sky in a spiral, symbolically shows such great and yet unstable process. Such subject may be considered a bit pretentious for a public artwork standing in the middle of the city where a lot of people move in and out; the artist wants people to think of Paradigm as a part of every paradigm changing process existing in everyday life. ■ with ARTINPOST

Conrad Shawcross, born in 1977 in London, is the artist who works with scientific rationality. He often appropriates redundant theories and methodologies to create ambitious structural and mechanical montages, using a wide variety of materials and media. His sculptures explore subjects that lie on the borders of geometry and philosophy, physics and metaphysics.
After Shawcross participated in a degree show of the British art school in 2001, he gained recognition for the work The Nervous System, a large, symmetrical, working loom producing over 20,000 meters of double-helix, he showed in 2004 at the Saatchi Gallery. He also came to the spotlight for the work that was inspired by Titian's masterpieces named Metamorphosis: Titian in 2012. In 2015, a new series of permanent sculpture was unveiled in Dulwich Park.
And he won the Art & Work 2008 Award for a commissioned site-specific work. In 2009, he was awarded the Illy prize for best solo exhibition at Art Brussels. In 2014, he won the Jack Goldhill Award for the show at Royal Academy of Arts.