Finn Ferrier
sculpture
sculpture
09/2020
Explosion Urn, Footed
120 meters, 7mm cotton rope
350 x 270 mm
Explosion Urn, Footed
120 meters, 7mm cotton rope
350 x 270 mm
This is an adventure into constructing larger vessels. Here I am trying to work with the rope to the point the material becomes an agent - so I have to work and respond to gravity and rope tension.
This particular shape is a response to nuclear testing during the 1960s in the Pacific. My great uncle was stationed at sea as a passive scientist/ protest collecting environmental data. This vessel contains invisible particulates.
Second image - as exhibited at the Tuesday Club during Art Week 2020, Auckland.
While making these soft vessels I adhere to a series of rules; one being that the form must take shape in one direction as one continuous line. No chemical bonds, only friction is used to transform the rope into an object.
This particular shape is a response to nuclear testing during the 1960s in the Pacific. My great uncle was stationed at sea as a passive scientist/ protest collecting environmental data. This vessel contains invisible particulates.
Second image - as exhibited at the Tuesday Club during Art Week 2020, Auckland.
While making these soft vessels I adhere to a series of rules; one being that the form must take shape in one direction as one continuous line. No chemical bonds, only friction is used to transform the rope into an object.
Finn Ferrier
(b.1981) lives in Auckland New Zealand. Ferrier has been exhibiting as an artist since 2002. His practice is focused on the object, story telling, materiality and place.
Ferrier’s Wharfware series began in 2009 as an excercise in exploring the materiality of rope.
This website contains a partial archive of my rope-work, representing one part of my practice.
Contact:
finnferrier@orcon.net.nz
Recent Events/ Exhibitions
2022
Dowse Museum: acquisition of ‘Covid Cup’ for their collection.
NZ Maritime Museum, acquisition of a body of work for their collection (2022)
New Zealand Maritime Museum, Edmonston Gallery temporary exhibition (2022)
Objectspace: Weekly Objects. Series of editioned garlands.
(07-2022)
Soft Landing, Page Galleries, Wellington (02-2022)
Finders, Sarjeant Gallery, Whanganui (12-2021 - 05-2022)
2021
Finn Ferrier: Ockham Lecture Series, Objectspace, Auckland
Leading Lights, Masterworks Gallery, Auckland.
Meet The Maker: Finn Ferrier. NZ House & Garden Magazine (April 2021)
Changing Threads 2021 Awards, Arts Council Nelson.
Award Finalist
2020
Finn Ferrier: Soft Garniture. Te Uru Art Gallery, Auckland (2020-2021)
A Few Too Many Hangups,
The Tuesday Club, Auckland
2019
The Nineteen Gallery: Relocating Frances Hodgkins. Auckland Art Gallery (2019)
Wharfware
These rope vessels were originally constructed with idea that they could be made at sea by a sailor, passing time by creating decorative objects for their surrounding. These vessels are the logical progression from the practice of decorative knots.
More recently I have been thinking about my rope works like ceramics. Instead of working with the materiality of clay to express form, I work with rope and the inherent properties of this material. I do not use any chemical bonds. Friction, tension and gravity determine the shapes, along with personal experience and tacit understanding.
These vessels are made in one direction with one piece of rope, with exception to handles, which are applied afterwards.
The conception of this rope-work series originally came about as an exploration of the ‘critique of preciousness’ a central theme in contemporary jewellery where it is the concept and making that determines the value of the object over a material value.
These vessels are intended to reflect a simple and elegant use of rope and rhythmic forms that allude to the processes of making and cyclical time.
++ See Ockham Lecure Series page for a talk on my practice ++
Photography: Sam Hartnett / Finn Ferrier
finnferrier(at)orcon.net.nz
