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Washington University in St. Louis
Sam Fox School of Design & Visual Arts

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Tomás Saraceno

Cosmic Filaments

2019

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Tomás Saraceno's experimental artistic practice combines the conventions of art, architecture, and the natural sciences to expand ideas about being and inhabiting the world. Cosmic Filaments is a site-specific installation comprising three iridescent objects that hang from the ceiling, a single polyhedron-shaped module out of which grow two larger clusters of three and five modules that together span the distance of the Museum's lobby.They are suspended in a network of ropes that replicate the tensile strength, flexibility, and absorbing visual intricacies of a spider web. The three geometric modules simultaneously evoke interstellar configurations, microscopic cellular systems, and biospheres in which humans could eventually exist.

This work is directly related to Saraceno's project Air-Port-City / Cloud City (2001-present), a visionary proposal for a city in the sky consisting of a series of bubble-like cells fueled by solar energy that migrate and recombine as freely as clouds themselves. Like Air-Port-City / Cloud City, Cosmic Filaments suggests a utopian vision of life in the air while also acting out a material and spatial investigation into issues of sustainability, mobility, cohabitation, and collectivity in the present. [Permanent collection label, 2023]

  • Artist Tomás Saraceno (Argentine, b. 1973)
  • Title Cosmic Filaments
  • Date 2019
  • Medium Dichroic filters, polyacrylic panels, stainless steel, and polyester rope
  • Dimensions overall | 17′6″ x 53′ x 27′8″
  • Credit line University purchase with funds from the William T. Kemper Foundation and Art on Campus fund, 2019
  • Object number WU 2019.0003

crates received 7/23/2019; installation complete 8/16/2019
the Artist and Tonya Bonakdar Gallery

This artwork record may be incomplete or need refinement. Our staff actively researches the collection and revises records when new information is available. If you have questions or comments about this record, please contact us.

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