We Fishing the Time (worm's holes and densities) 1999

Curator: This is "We Fishing the Time (worm's holes and densities)" a mixed media installation by Ernesto Neto created in 1999. Editor: My immediate impression is one of surreal biology. These forms, hanging suspended, remind me of internal organs or perhaps jellyfish drifting in some unknown ocean. Curator: The installation explores spatial relations through organic forms. Neto is known for his use of tactile materials like stretchy fabric, spices, and polystyrene. Here, the ethereal quality of the suspended shapes certainly evokes an organic minimalism. Note the translucence of the fabric, allowing light to play across its surfaces. Editor: Translucence indeed, and observe how that luminosity changes. The colour pools and intensifies at the lower portions of the forms. It leads my eye downward, anchoring these light, almost weightless shapes, hinting at some primal connection to earth or gravity. I wonder about Neto’s intention. Fishing the Time – is he referencing the ephemeral nature of existence itself? Curator: Interesting observation. Structurally, each element acts as a module, but the irregularity in their placement complicates any simplistic grid-like reading. It refuses perfect order. The texture of the material introduces entropy. What could it signify, the use of those colours down below, drawing us to the ground as it were? Editor: Perhaps it touches on alchemy. There’s a visual transformation, and that golden color reminds me of symbolic quests for knowledge. Each form, dangling like an alchemical retort, is imbued with an implied transformative process, with visual weight concentrated downwards, towards some grounding element. And that colour speaks to life, organicism, an earthy spirituality if you will. Curator: A persuasive argument. To me the varying colour saturation indicates change within these hanging "worms' holes and densities", or vessels. But how can one describe the nature of these vessels—as open or enclosed forms? The interplay of tension and slackness defines each of its physical parameters. They beckon viewers into the piece, into this unique interaction of space, form and material. Editor: Thinking about our conversation, I find a melancholy in it – these hanging vessels suggest mortality while evoking spiritual quests and alchemic seeking. Curator: And I’m reminded that an appreciation for spatial form allows us entry points to ideas we might otherwise have trouble describing in words.