Proposal for a Reading Machine II (You, With Your Opacity), 2011
Hand-engraved brass, brass brackets
Long-term loan from the artist
Much of Athanasios Argianas’s work employs systems of formal and conceptual circularity to address the idea of non-linear time, while his practice often explores the possibility of translating sensory experiences. Here, a polished brass tube is bent halfway down its length, as if descending a step, while appearing to have been spliced open and “unrolled” into a flat sheet. The form of the work refers to the mathematical shapes used by modern physicists to represent spacetime continuums. At the same time, the sculpture has been designed to resemble a handrail, fixed onto the wall at a height that invites the viewer to hold or lean on it. This contact will oxidise the brass, recording on its surface the traces of the hands that touch it. Where the twist of the tube reveals its inner surface, a text is hand-etched in a recognisable Art Deco font from the previous century: of the weight of your words, of your gut and spirit, you with your opacity. A work that comments on the disembodied, weightless nature of our words and emotions takes the form of a utilitarian aid for our vulnerable bodies. It is an opaque work, open to multiple readings.
Athanasios Argianas is an interdisciplinary artist and composer. Although deeply rooted in sculpture, his practice extends into music, film, painting, text, and performance. His research on the transformation of sensory experience into visual form has led to works such as the Song Machines series, which proposes ways to transform sound into three-dimensional form and vice versa. These are metallic sculptural constructions engraved with lyrics or phrases that evoke the physical, visual manifestation of a musical score. Since 2005, the artist has developed several more series of ‘machines’ that function as physical translations of musical structures, lyrics, and sensory data.
Athanasios Argianas was born in 1976 in Athens. He lives and works between Athens and London.
