DRAWING IN MOTION—ZILVINAS KEMPINAS’S DOUBLE O AT MoMA

Zilvinas Kempinas’s sculptures are magic. Somehow, the air currents created by two industrial-strength fans turn the two loops of videotape in Double O into a living, dancing sculpture, performing tirelessly for hours in MoMA’s Agnes Gund Garden Lobby.

Zilvinas Kempinas. Double O. 2008. Installation view at MoMA as part of On Line: Drawing Through the Twentieth Century. Photo by Jason Mandella

This work is presented as part of the exhibition On Line: Drawing Through the Twentieth Century, currently on view on the Museum’s sixth floor, and its inclusion in this context encourages us to reconsider what makes a work a drawing. Kempinas isn’t working with pencil, pen, or paper, but Double O is very much a drawing in space, a mass of lines activating the real world rather than a two-dimensional surface. The work recalls that of many other artists included in the exhibition—for example, Alexander Calder, whose mobile sculptures also respond to the air currents created by the movement of viewers, and Vasily Kandinsky, whose black ink lines dance across the page.

In the video above, the artist talks about his choice of materials and why he is drawn to them. Have a look, and then come by the Museum to see Double O in action. You’ll never see the same work twice.