“…and the sons of pullman porters and the sons of engineers ride their father’s magic carpet made of steel…”
This is a work about inertia. The idea is to create a plaything, an object that allows YOU to interact with rolling mass equivalent to a loaded railroad freight car. In this case, the load is big slabs of stone and a lot of humans.
This human powered merry-go-round of granite and steel will have a moving weight of about 80,000lbs plus people. Hop on for a ride. The ring will be surfaced with thick slabs of granite and two kinetic elements will add or subtract energy from the spinning ring. All mass in motion.
A limited number of equity shares in this sculpture are now available. Return on sale or lease of sculpture. Minimum investment $500. Please contact universe@zacharycoffin.com for more information.
Note: The design has been evolving rapidly. Moving from a trio of elements to a dichotomy. The video above shows an early version. Here is a screenshot showing the design direction, more to come:
Physical work has begun!
Here is Jol making the template for the 16 20 granite slabs that will clad the main part of the ring. These slabs are being quarried in Elberton, GA by the generous Blue Sky quarry. They measure 8 inches thick and will weigh about 2800lbs each. Here is Jol cutting the template out of some luan we had around, pre-painted:
He is about to hop in my truck and make the pilgrimage to the quarry to cut the stone. Update– my original stone slabs were slightly larger than the capacity of the quarries, we are reducing the size and increasing the number in order to make it work. This re-jiggers all the design connections etc. Ok, and from the top.
X marks the keyhole at Burning Man:
This the location for the work. It is a funny spot with all kinds of mo-jo, the number of people and energy level is high. If an interactive sculpture can be broken by humans, this is an excellent place to try. In some ways, this work is a dialogue with the participants of Burning Man at that particular spot. Oh, the humanity….
