Tara Donovan's cloud-molecule: art object "Untitled"

2024 Author: Richard Flannagan | [email protected]. Last modified: 2023-12-15 23:55

42-year-old artist Tara Donovan lives and works in New York. Her works are unusual art objects made from materials such as scotch tape, disposable cups and drinking straws. Moreover, the artist first chooses the material, and only then begins to come up with something to sculpt out of it. As a result, phenomenal installations are obtained, similar to coral reefs, haystack, mycelium. The last work of Tara Donovan - "Untitled" - is either gray clouds, or giant molecules - depending on how you look.

Tara Donovan transforms artificial materials into art objects that resemble wildlife. Her works are distinctive, which is emphasized by both colleagues - artists and sculptors, and critics. In the age of postmodernity, it would seem that the world has disintegrated into quotes and the modern person is surrounded almost at every step by all sorts of reminders of what has already been created earlier (many imitate, borrow, "push their heads against" quotes, carving new meanings from already created artistic forms - sometimes deliberately, then involuntarily).

The phrase, spoken by Isaac Newton, about dwarfs on the shoulders of giants, is again relevant. At such a time, something fundamentally new is especially appreciated, without references to the work of great predecessors, without "backing up" by their authority, their name. Such are the works of Tara Donovan - impressive and imitating only nature itself.

This time, the disposable plates, toothpicks and safety pins that the artist had previously dealt with were replaced by another common material - mylar. This is a durable packaging film. Meters of this film form an intricate organic structure over 3 meters high.

Folded in a special way, mylar is assembled into spherical objects, which, in turn, combine into a huge molecule. Its surface shimmers in shades of gray, like a cloud before a thunderstorm. There are shadows in the folds of the material, the upper layers shine and glare.

Tara Donovan, who created an ambiguous art object, absolutely does not impose any interpretation on the audience. This is already confirmed by the fact that the project bears the name "Untitled": they say, think what you want, but most importantly - think.