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Josiah McElheny at the Henry Art Gallery

Josiah McElheny, “The Last Sacterring Surface” (detail), Hand blown glass, chrome painted aluminum, rigging, electric lighting. Courtesy of Donald Young Gallery.

The Last Scattering Surface, an enormous spherical sculpture composed of metal and glass by Art21 artist Josiah McElheny (Season 3), has traveled to the University of Washington’s Henry Art Gallery. The sculpture is on view through August 17, 2008.

The Henry will also exhibit a series of conceptual drawings and the artist‚Äôs first film, shot on location at the New York Metropolitan Opera House. The film features the 1965-commissioned Lobmeyer chandeliers, which were gifts of the Austrian government. The largest of these chandeliers is lit with 260 bulbs, measures over 20 feet across, and weighs one and a half tons. In 1966, Austrian Foreign Minister Lujo Toncic-Soring declared them ‚Äúforever a shining and glittering symbol of the friendship between Austria and the United States.” While The Last Scattering Surface relates to industrial design of the mid-1960s and the science of the Big Bang, it also relates to a historical moment when “the universal linear narrative of modernity‚Äôs progress began to fracture, instigating a ‘scattering’ of histories and viewpoints about society‚Äôs development over the ages.”

Read more about the exhibition here.

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