Paul Kos
Sound of Ice Melting
19700101
Paul Kos, Sound of Ice Melting, 1970. Installation.
Sound of Ice Melting is based on the ancient Zen Buddhist koan about the sound of one hand clapping. Here, Kos has surrounded two twenty-five-pound blocks of ice with eight microphones that call to mind the political press conferences prevalent during the Vietnam War era when this piece was created. Zen practice values such absurdity as a way to transcend the limitations of ordinary discourse and rational thought—empirical processes at the root of all political conflicts.
Paul Kos is part of the Bay Area Conceptual movement that pioneered video performance and installation art in the late sixties and early seventies. Calling himself a materials-based conceptual artist, he explores properties of various materials not traditionally associated with art and often includes a sound dimension to his work. Kos’s work often shows a slightly absurdist sense of humor which he crystallizes into memorable, smart, and funny images, something shared with that of fellow Californian Bruce Nauman. Kos works with everyday materials and video to enact a playful conceptual engagement with life and the world. He has made sculptures from salt blocks, to be licked away by cows, and has carefully microphoned melting blocks of ice. Throughout these pieces, Kos’s work uses humor to relate the stuff of life back to larger questions of temporality and spirituality.