Welded steel, 1997. Nonextant.
A stage is a raised platform for performance and also one phase of a longer progression, and the sculpture is built around the first meaning. A long flat plate overhangs a deep recess with a plain back wall, and the plate and the framing posts make an opening that reads as a proscenium. The recess is dark and empty. At the right end a framed bay holds two shelves, a place where props or costumes would wait at the side of the stage.
The body doesn’t sit on the ground. A lower slab carries it on two round supports, a rounded block at the left and a ball at the right, and a short handle projects from the right end. They read as rollers and a pull. A stage on rollers is a stage that can be brought to its audience, set down where the people are and played, and then moved on.
The performance is the part that isn’t here. The overhead plate, the opening and the wings are all in place, and nothing stands in the recess. The sculpture is a theatre in transit between shows.
