Antony Gormley: Firmament IV

Overview

In games of “would you rather?”, I was often asked “would you rather be blind of deaf?”; after seeing Antony Gormley’s Firmament IV, I wonder why the game never included “... or forego the ability to perceive space?” First installed in the below-ground gallery of White Cube Mason’s Yard in March 2008, this is the concepts’ fourth outing. 1030 steel balls, each the size of a shot put, and 1849 steel elements are welded together to create a non-regular, polygonal structure that meanders and struggles to fit within the white cube (the structure measures over 20 metres in height). Look away now if you don’t want the surprise to be ruined, but the structure is representative of a human in the foetal position. Duh!

Within the four walls of Anna Schwartz’s gallery space, the man-in-the-form-of-a-molecular-structure creates a “double space” that disturbs precisely because it proposes occupation before our own subject-inhabitation. The graphic outline of this figure is reminiscent of a shed snake skin; it even resembles a banana peel, with its insides consumed. One is reminded of Le Breton, who noted that in some societies the body does not form a boundary, but is open to flow and exchange with the environment. Most will not be able to resist the temptation to climb through the delineation of this figure.

The perceived expansive force of Gormley’s sculpture is undeniably impressive. One more push, and it would break through the embryonic white walls. Any why not indeed? Run down to Anna Schwartz before it does, because this work, if liberated, loses all its potency.