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May Issue 2003
NC Museum of Art in Raleigh, NC, Offers Series of 25-Foot-Tall Creations Commissioned for Flight Centennial Exhibition
Inspired by Russian fighter pilots performing stunts at 700 mph, husband-and-wife artists Bill and Mary Buchen have created five 25-foot-tall Flight Wind Reeds, which will spin, pivot and flip in the winds coursing across the North Carolina Museum of Art's grounds in Raleigh, NC. The project is the second major installation for the Museum's ambitious exhibition, Defying Gravity: Contemporary Art and Flight, on view from Nov. 2, 2003 through Mar. 7, 2004.
"The Flight Wind Reeds render visible the invisible: the motion, speed, sound and physical energy of the wind," said Linda Dougherty, adjunct associate curator of contemporary art at the NC Museum of Art. "These sculptures were inspired by the aerial stunts of Russian fighter pilots, who fly their planes at 700 miles per hour, and then suddenly cut the engines off, causing the planes to flip up and backward. In a similar manner, the sleek, aerodynamic Flight Wind Reeds perform a similar stunt: spinning and then flipping up in response to the movement of the wind." Flight Wind Reeds consists of five steel forms, each perched atop 25-foot-tall poles and referencing elements of flight and the abstracted parts of an airplane. The works make music as bells fastened on each reed are activated by the wind.
The Buchens, a husband-and-wife team based in New York, created their first such wind reeds in the late 1990s, but their career together dates back to 1972. Since that time, they have collaborated on a number of multidisciplinary works of art they describe as "sonic architecture."
"Sonic architecture refers to the form or shape of the acoustic field generated by our artworks," said Mary Buchen. "That field is dependent upon natural phenomena. In the case of the Flight Wind Reeds, the acoustic field - the movement of the reeds and the range and direction of the radiating bell sounds - is constantly changing as the wind 'plays' the structures and generates a 'soundscape.'"
The Buchens' works include Sound Carnival at an elementary school playground in Brooklyn; the Bell Garden at the Connecticut Juvenile Training School; Aeolian (wind) harps on the University of Connecticut's Groton campus; a Wind Pavilion at The WILDS in Cumberland, OH; harmonic SunCatchers at the Arizona Science Center in Phoenix; sun gongs and an Earth drum for Orchestra in San Francisco's Candlestick State Recreation Park; and others throughout the US and abroad.
Defying Gravity: Contemporary Art and Flight is the nation's most ambitious contemporary art exhibition celebrating the centennial of powered flight. Including more than 90 major works and several special commissions, the exhibition examines the interaction between aviation and the imagination and explores the timeless human desire to fly. The exhibition is part of Into the Blue, the Museum's yearlong celebration to commemorate the 100th anniversary of the Wright brothers' historic 1903 flight. Defying Gravity and Into the Blue are presented by Blue Cross and Blue Shield of North Carolina.
Even Exchange Dance Theater will present an improv dance performance inspired by Flight Wind Reeds on June 14, at 11am and noon.
For further information
check our NC Institutional Gallery listings, call the Museum at
919/839-6262 or on the web at (www.ncartmuseum.org).
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