DISCOMFORTING DELIGHT

摘要

Undulant is such a beautiful word. Its generous vowels so aptly match the wave-like motion it describes with a lulling, torpid comfort. Undulant qualifies the form of a surface, beneath which something perhaps more mysterious is at play. Its fluid nature is capable of unpredictable, even monstrous change and holds below its surface our fear of the unseen. The gentleness of form belies an inherent sense of discomfort, and it is from this perspective that I propose to consider the latest collaboration between architect Alice Hampson and artist Sebastian Di Mauro. Undulant is a public art installation for the entry foyer of the child and maternal health and welfare centre in the sprawling city suburb of Logan. It was commissioned under the Queensland Government's Art Built-in programme, which allocates two per cent of the funding of all new government buildings (except prisons) for the commission of public artworks. Hampson and Di Mauro sought to physically engage both children and adults with this work and to generate a dynamic and memorable set of poetic, spatial and social relationships within its modest waiting room setting. Undulant establishes a dialectical conversation with its context as a primary conceptual tactic: it is giant-sized rather than precious, a section rather than a discrete object, curved and hairy instead of rectilinear and smooth.