Noli Timere, Sculpture #1 (Milan), Italy, 2023
Description
Echelman’s traveling artwork Noli Timere premiered at the Palazzo del Senato during Milan Design Week 2023.
The sculpture depicts two sculptural forms which touch at a single point, yet its fields of color wash from one form through the air into the other as if the space between them decreases to nothing. Echelman describes inspiration in artworks where spaces between things become charged, citing Picasso’s portraits of lovers and Michelangelo’s depiction of the space between the hands of God and Adam in the Sistine Chapel.
The artwork’s title is Latin for ‘don’t be afraid’ - the last words written by Nobel Prize-winning poet Seamus Heaney, written to his wife in the moments before his death. Artist Janet Echelman collaborated with Heaney early in her career when they were both in residence at the same house at Harvard University in the 1990s. Echelman describes the Noli Timere sculpture as an intimate inquiry into the relationship between fear and love. It is a visual exploration of the nature of separation, connection, and interdependence.
materials and size
Fiber, Buildings and Sky combined with Colored Lighting. Fibers are braided with nylon and UHMWPE (Ultra-high molecular weight polyethylene)
Dimensions of net: 73 ft. length x 26 ft. width x 12 ft. depth
CREDITS
Art: Janet Echelman
Studio Echelman Project Manager: Melissa Henry
Studio Echelman Design Team: Daniel Smith, Adam Burke
Sculpture Engineering: SOM San Francisco: Alessandro Beghini, Nicole Wang
Client: Kohler Co.
Project Production and Management: Freesmeier Projects
Project Communications: The Beacon, Kohler Wisconsin
Lighting Design & Installation: Aldo Sala at WindUP
Production Director: Giuseppe Poletti at Freesmeier Projects
Installation Engineering: Vito Cafato
Sound Experience: Barbara Boeing
Photography: Janet Echelman, Kohler Co.
Special Acknowledgement: Ministero della Cultura Italia
location
Palazzo del Senato, Milan, Italy
PRESS
