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Underground > Art, Fashion & Design >

Shadow Art

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15:27 / 19.06.07

Wow. I'm really keen on this.

Check out especially HE/SHE where piles of trash create portraits of the artists peeing.

This is some amazingly detailed work. I can only imagine how much attention and time it must take to craft something that looks like a heap of trash from every angle, and projects a photorealistic shadow of a person, or two people.

The link has some work by other artists in the same tradition, but Noble and Webster's work is the most interesting to me. Any other examples?

12:08 / 20.06.07

No I don't have any but it's fascinating. Thank you for linking to it. I like 'Dirty White Trash' because it's made with their own rubbish, and is presumably them in the portrait. I don't understand how they do it though, it looks like an impossible task.

07:38 / 21.06.07

Thanks for the link, this stuff is amazing.

15:57 / 21.06.07

When I was doing some research on Picasso, I read, in a Roland Penrose book, that the author, visiting Picasso's studio during the 1930s when his relationship with Marie-Therese Walter was still fairly secret (from the artist's wife especially), was shown a massive lump of clay. He was a bit surprised by Picasso's enthusiasm, as some of the actual sculptures there were of great quality. Then Picasso turned on a light, and the shadow cast by the lump was a perfect silhouette of his lover's features...

But I love the Noble and Webster ones. Seeing the trash and the contrast between the image projected, as it were, is sublime, witty, impressive, tricksy and more as well. Plays with notions of art, of value, of interpretation. Picasso's lost project is too sweet really! Whereas Noble and Webster have teeth.

misterdomino.org

20:08 / 21.06.07

Yeah, this is blowing my mind, trying to figure out how this is done. I...I just don't see it. WTF. Awesome, though.

20:08 / 26.06.07

This is incredible! I had a hard time believing it was even real!

23:04 / 28.06.07

That is trippy as hell I think it's time for me to do some shadow art hunting.

08:22 / 29.06.07

If you're in London and fancy seeing one in the flesh, I'm pretty sure there's one of these at the current RA Summer Exhibition. A pile of bits transformed into two rats having it off.

08:24 / 29.06.07

Note: no idea who it's by, I just clocked it on the telly during a 'look at some of the stuff they've got on display' bit.

16:42 / 06.07.07

I remember seeing these creations on the web ages ago, they still blow my mind whenever I see them

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I presume have an alternative way of thinking that allows them to create these constructions that we simply cannot understand.

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20:15 / 06.07.07

Having been thinking about it for awhile, I doubt it's an alternative way of thinking that we mere mundanes cannot understand. It's much more impressive when you think of it as a skill developed with much work and practice, involving looking at an object and its shadow and being able to visualize what kind of shadow it would make if something else were added or taken away.

If I wanted to do something like this, and had all the time in the world to try, I'd draw out the shape I wanted it to make and put it on the wall, get a really bright light, and start building the sculpture like a jigsaw puzzle, trying to fit the pieces together right so that the shadow will fill up the shape I'm aiming for. The real difficulty, and where the artistry really comes into play, I think, is in making the shadow look like an accident, like there's no way in the world that sculpture (or pile of junk) could possibly make that shadow. I think that's the genius of Webster and Noble. Just looking at the objects, I can't see how the light hitting them could actually make a shadow that shape.

23:35 / 06.07.07

Perhaps, maybe the idea of an alternative way of thinking is more appealing, like something out of fantasy. What you say is far more logical... but I still can't help but wonder...