INVISIBLE SCULPTURE FULL
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The juxtaposition of seminal works by Beuys with specially selected materials – including many unpublished items – is designed to reignite the debate regarding the significance of his oeuvre and to locate his work in a broader cultural and socio-political context.

Taking Joseph Beuys’s expanded concept of art as its starting point, »the invisible sculpture« resists the historicization and canonization of his work. This exhibition revisits his work in the context of the present global debate on ecology and democracy. Beuys’s visionary commitment to democracy expanded the international concept of art. Still, it beats NFT artwork, if only on the consideration that “I Am” has a non-existent footprint.This exhibition at the UNESCO world heritage site highlights the socio-political dimension of the work of Joseph Beuys and addresses its importance for the present and the future. Or, if you’re feeling more generous, you can always say Garau sold an idea of a work of art. After all, don’t we give shape to a God we have never seen?” “It therefore has energy that condenses and transforms itself into particles, in short, in us! When I decide to ‘exhibit’ an immaterial sculpture in a given space, that space will concentrate a certain quantity and density of thoughts in a precise point, creating a sculpture that from my title alone will take the most varied forms.

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“The successful outcome of the auction testifies to an irrefutable fact: the void is nothing but a space full of energy, and even if we empty it and nothing remains, according to Heisenberg’s uncertainty principle that nothingness has a weight,” he says. That space is not empty but occupied by the energy of the sculpture he removed from it. To those assuming Garau might have pulled the smartest art prank since the banana taped to the wall piece (which sold for $120,000), a word from Garau: he didn’t sell nothing he created a void. Presumably, special lighting and climate control in that space are optional, since you can’t see the piece either way.

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There is no physical representation of the sculpture, neither in print or digital format, because it is “invisible.” The only physical way to confirm it exists is the new owner’s certificate of authenticity, which is where parallels with NFT art can be drawn.Īccording to Il Giorno, the piece should be displayed in a special room, in a space free from obstruction, of about 150x150 cm (4.92x4.92 feet). We're talking about a void, as the Italian media describes it, a completely white space filled with energy, an invisible, immaterial sculpture.Ĭreated by Sardinia-born artist Salvatore Garau, “I Am” was sold at an Art-Rite auction for €15,000 (approximately $18,300 at the current exchange rates). It’s a sculpture called “I Am” and it both proves you don’t need technology to make art and that you really can pay a small fortune on nothingness. You’d also be excused if you thought people paid a lot of (digital) money for stuff that didn’t exist in reality.īut here’s a piece of art that kicks NFT butt, big time.

You would be excused if you assumed humanity is finally heading into that highly technologized future it’s been dreaming about for decades.

Invisible sculpture