Any Gleeful God (2023)

Crow Perch gallery, Berlin

Any Gleeful God is an erotic narrative in the form of poetic sculpture. Its first spark was set of strict constraints regarding location, space, and materials – leading to specific choices of media and sculptural material … leading to a restricted selection and number of words … leading to the construction of the artwork. From this backwards trajectory emerged a poem about what happens when desire meets prohibition.

The artwork – installed in open-air gallery Crow Perch, located on a public pathway through Berlin allotments – is composed of word blocks arranged and pressed into air-dried clay, which is wrapped in copper barbed wire. (Turns out physical art has a life of its own: in the first week of installation, moisture escaping from the clay steamed up the display window, making it impossible to see clearly – the perfect metaphor for the theme!)

In addition to the physical sculpture – which can only be visited if happened upon by chance or via a map delivered by special request – ANY GLEEFUL GOD includes a digital layer: anyone who makes it to the site may point their camera to the QR code and follow the instructions to view a geolocated augmented reality piece of Any Gleeful God, and claim it as a Proof of Presence (POP) NFT, for free.

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Process notes: 

You can’t place two slabs of clay next to each other, smooth over the gap, and expect them to merge. They have to be smashed together and worked. 

As time passes, everything changes and shifts, creating unexpected – sometimes intriguing – shapes, cracks and gaps.

The word “promises” sounds like it might be the end of the sentence – but it’s not.

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