Twenty-Nine tragedies
August - December 2023 / Laumeier Sculpture Park, St. Louis MO / powder-coated aluminium, rip-stock nylon, kite hardware
Twenty-Nine Tragedies is an unfolding sequence of site-specific outdoor sculptures that are installed in existing trees at art institutions. A series of multi-colored diamond kites appear to be crashed and trapped in trees, their forms crumpled or pierced by the impact and their tails animated by the weather, tangling over time within the branches. A viewer coming across this work is rewarded for paying attention and looking up. This piece, discovered rather than pointed at, invites an audience to consider themselves carefully attuned to the material remains of life’s idiosyncrasies. The kites read as a colorful aftermath of an implied celebratory event. A kite festival gone wrong. A family afternoon that ended in tears. A sudden gust of wind that broke the string tethering the kite its owner.
“Twenty-Nine Tragedies opens countless conversations including but not limited to sculpture in nature, the relationship between comedy and failure, the expressive design and function of kites, engineering and the science of flight.”
Individual sculptures prior to installation in living trees
““Kites are objects of creative play and wonder, a type of kinetic sculpture that ties the user directly to nature, toying with a delicate balance between control and chance. Clayton and Lewis’ vibrant, aluminum kites become a tangled monument to the comedy in the tragedy of a kite, both propelled and obstructed by mother nature. The tangled web of color, shape and string imparts a sense of humor central to their practice and expresses the amusement, creativity and the intersection between us and the natural world.””