Michael Landy

H.2.N.Y. Skeleton of the Dump

H.2.N.Y Skeleton of the Dump revolves entirely around the performance Homage to New York (1960), of the Swiss artist Jean Tinguely (1925-1991), during which the machine built by the artist in the gardens of the Museum of Modern Art (MOMA) had to self-destruct itself in 27 minutes, but, in the end, it had to be finished off by firemen being called in after it erupted in flames. Since the discovery of Jean Tinguely’s retrospective at the Tate Gallery in London, in 1982, Michael Landy spent two years researching and sketching (charcoal, oil, glue, ink) from his previous research carried out at Museum Tinguely in Basel, and at the MOMA in New York. By labor-intensive work, Michael Landy tried to recapture the essence of the event, to dislocate and to revive it with these black and white drawings. He made them on several scales, some very small, some medium format, and some, like this, large scale. Made with oil stick or white glue or both, he played on the idea of mezzotint as well as the idea of nighttime performance. The images are based on the film made of Tinguely’s action. Some drawings are made as though within the machine, and others, like this one, are made as though observing the machine from a distance. In certain drawings the machine is self-destructing, in others it is complete. H.2.N.Y Skeleton of the Dump shows the machine in lonely isolation, almost an outsider and rather forlorn. The motif itself is simply the white paper showing through.