Kat Austen, CultureLab editor
(Image: Luca Pozzi)
The ability to reconcile quantum theory and gravity in a grand theory of everything is the holy grail of physicists. Yet despite the best efforts of theoretical physicists, it is still beyond their grasp. Now they have a helping hand from an unusual quarter.
Fascinated by string theory and inspired by the concept of gravity as a unifying principle, Italian artist Luca Pozzi embarked in 2009 on a research project looking at micro and macro scales as a whole. ?When you are thinking about creation there is always a moment that you have to limit your range. When you do that, you limit, in a way, the potentiality of your system,? he says. Pozzi?s sculptures are part of this dialogue. Many of them defy gravity, using magnetic materials to suspend objects in unlikely positions - such as Dragon Wings, in which tennis and ping pong balls are captured by invisible forces, trapped against the underside of an aluminium pair of abstract wings, or positioned incongruously half-way down the wing?s slope, full of unrealised potential energy.
Pozzi has collaborated with numerous scientists in his research into physical phenomena. Having been a guest at The Albert Einstein Institute in Potsdam, Germany, La Facult? de Science de Luminy in Marseille, France, and The Perimeter Institute for Theoretical Physics in Waterloo, Ontario, Canada. Pozzi's latest collaboration was with Abhay Asthekar, director of the Institute for Gravitation and the Cosmos at Pennsylvania State University, US. For this he worked on a new way to illustrate Big Bounce Theory - which suggests the creation of our universe came at the collapse of another. His artwork formed the cover of Asthekar?s treatise on the subject.
The new installation of Pozzi?s work defies gravity. Part of the Higher Atlas exhibition, which opens this Wednesday at the 2012 Marrakech Biennale, Pozzi?s The Star Platform uses an electromagnetic levitation field to suspend five sea-sponges and a metal egg above an aluminium star. With the incongruity of the sculpture he aims to embody the warping of space and make the viewer perceive gravity in a less certain light. Yet, like much of Pozzi?s work, the piece is intentionally non-specific in nature, something he thinks adds to its accessibility.
Pozzi got the idea for incorporating levitation into his work when he met electronic engineer Janick Simeray of Simerlab studio in Hong Kong. How does he make these objects hover over water and aluminium? Contrary to his usual ethos of making complicated details accessible, he remains cagey about the exact details of how it works: ?It is top secret,? he insists.
By using the imagery of contemporary art, Pozzi hopes that he is opening up the concepts of theoretical physics to the general public: ?The main idea behind this work is that the knowledge is for everybody.? He hopes that by using ?different platforms, different languages, different doors? he will convey the message to as many people as possible.
Luca Pozzi's work features in the Higher Atlas exhibition, which will run at the Marrakech Biennale from 29 February to 3 June. Other art and performance events will run from 29 February to 4 March as part of the fourth Marrakech Biennale.
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