Detail of Measuring Stick at Sarah Sze’s Manhattan studio.
Production still from the series ART21 Exclusive. © ART21, Inc. 2016. Cinematography: John Marton.
“To have these extreme scale shifts in the experience in a very close proximity – that is actually the way we perceive things.” — Sarah Sze
Today’s ART21 Exclusive features Sarah Sze discussing her sculpture Measuring Stick (2015), which explores the “measurement of time and space through the moving image.” Sze remembers watching Charles and Ray Eames’s Powers of Ten as a young student in the 1970s, and cites the film as an inspiration for her work. “That was something I always looked forward to seeing.”
Sze’s sculpture originally began as a film but evolved into a three-dimensional work that resembles an editing desk, reflecting the moving image through the inclusion of flickering light and references to “scientist image-makers.” Sze describes the diaphanous sculpture as an “experimental site” that “tries to actually measure a kind of behavior.”
CREDITS: Producer: Ian Forster. Consulting Producer: Wesley Miller & Nick Ravich. Interview: Ian Forster. Editor: Morgan Riles. Camera: John Marton & Andrew Whitlatch. Sound: Ian Forster. Artwork Courtesy: Sarah Sze & Tanya Bonakdar Gallery. Special Thanks: Mike Barnett & Lissa McClure.
ART21 Exclusive is supported, in part, by the New York City Department of Cultural Affairs in partnership with the City Council; 21c Museum Hotel, and by individual contributors.
