Leonardo On-Line







Fig. 9

Mario Ramiro, Campo de Força (Force Field), steel and 220-V heating elements, 132 x 86 x 86 cm, 1986. The thermal sculptures in the Force Field series are characterized by a heat-radiating source within the object that warms up and creates disturbances in the air around it. The radiating heat "models" the atmospheric space around the source, establishing the presence of a volume whose presence is normally invisible to us. The viewer perceives this expanding immaterial volume through the sense of touch, via sensations created on the surface of the skin through thermal variations in space. This permits the observer to feel the "thickness" of the radiating field around the object. The sculpture is both the source of the heat mass projected in space and the invisible field in motion.







Between Form and Force