Conversation 1999

Curator: Let’s delve into George Rickey's "Conversation" from 1999. This metal sculpture installation strikes me as strangely unsettling despite its geometric form. It feels unfinished. What do you make of it? Editor: I see your point. The way the metal is worked... It looks industrial, almost like leftover parts from a factory, placed here in a public square, perhaps drawing attention to the city's industry. Curator: Precisely! Consider the context. It's a piece made of metal, displayed in a cityscape. Think about the labor involved in the extraction of those raw materials, the processes that shaped them, and the social structures that enable their existence. What's the relationship between art, the means of production, and public space? Editor: So you are less focused on it as “high art” and more as the consequence of an industrialised society? The sculpture feels removed, aloof, especially juxtaposed against that building. The material feels very cold and uninviting. Curator: Exactly. Rickey challenges that high/low art division. His sculptures employ the materiality of industrial production—metal, a common material in an urban setting—to investigate movement and balance, making it a study of urban materials, motion, and their associated labour, and a reflection on how such processes affect how we “converse” in our daily lives. Where do you see its site specificity fitting in to that reading? Editor: Interesting. The water further underscores the material processes as water is essential for manufacture but is ultimately rendered functionless. So Rickey reframes it as something almost meditative in function... Curator: Precisely! Water is intrinsic to how material forms take shape but also intrinsic to public spaces! The placement encourages dialogue about material use and production but invites the city to reflect upon what shapes public life! Any further thoughts about its implications? Editor: I hadn’t thought about the artistic value through that lens. I learned that the real art may not only reside in aesthetic enjoyment but also within the awareness it brings to how we engage in our socio-economic relationships.