Working Group

Time Piece is a sculpture that gives form to different cycles of time—geologic time, 24-hour-time, and the intimate and embodied ways we individually measure time across our own lives: the life-time of a pair of socks, a friendship, the birth of a child. The objects that comprise this work: a boulder, a digital clock, and a laundry rack with a sock, signify these often conflicting concepts of time as they relate to climate change.

 

Each object betrays our expectations of it, enacting a protest or inherent resistance to its own duties. The boulder is a polymer simulation. The clock—which sounds a different bird call each hour—does not represent accurate time, but rather randomly moves forward and backward, as though confused. The sock, hanging to dry, is actually two socks sewn together, impossible to wear. Alongside the mis-matched reality of its companions, the ever-changing readout on the clock leaves the viewer uncertain as to ‘what time’ the clock showing, which manifests the tension and confusion around the climate crisis.

By appropriating found objects so that visitors might consider how a rock, sock, and a clock allow us to think about time and how our concepts of time relate to our understanding—and more importantly—our sense of urgency around climate change.