[ISEA2022] Artist Statement: Paul Friedlander — Tycho: Test One

Artist Statement

May 27-July 23, Centre d’Art Cal Massó de Reus, Beep Collection: Origins. Public event.

Tycho was one of the last astronomers to carry out all his work without a telescope as he died in 1601, shortly before its invention. Instead his observatory contained a great globe and numerous quadrants and astrolabes. It was thinking about the experience of being in this strange observatory that was in part to inspire this installation. It also happens that the work in luminous concrete has come to take on a shape approximating the monolith in the movie 2001, and that it was discovered by astronauts on the moon, according to the story, concealed under dust in the floor of the crater Tycho.
[Source: Ars Electronica/flickr: https://www.flickr.com/photos/arselectronica/44513806421]

  • Paul Friedlander (UK) is a kinetic light sculptor first trained as a physicist. Born in Manchester 1951, raised in Cambridge on a diet of relativity, cosmology and contemporary art. My father, F G Friedlander FRS, was a reader at the Department of Applied Mathematics and Theoretical Physics which was also home to Stephen Hawking. My mother, Yolande was a locally known artist, painter and ceramicist. One time aspiring cosmologist and interstellar propulsion expert. Metamorphosed to stage lighting designer, scientific artist and light sculptor. 1972 BSc in physics from Sussex University, my personal tutor, Sir Anthony Leggett, subsequently received the Nobel Prize for work on superfluidity. 1976 BA in Fine Art from Exeter College of Art. Exhibited on four continents and more than twenty countries. http://www.paulfriedlander.com