Momentum at NMN

Tracing the fissured landscape of the Bonneville Salt Flats, the installation explores concepts of the here and now, the relationship of change and time, and one's standpoint in a world that is undergoing major changes due to human influences. A broken sculpture forming a Newton’s pendulum speaks to moments past.

Filmed at the Bonneville Salt Flats, a primeval lake – today, a salt desert and land-speed-record test ground and using my shadow and a butterfly as motifs, the video explores the relationship of change and time and touches upon the human-made climate catastrophe through an intra- and intertextual elliptical narrative.

The sculptures made from salt are shaped like double-sided fists. Each contains a ceramic core formed like a knot. The symbol of the fist speaks to change, a revolutionary force and transformation, while the knot inside is unsolvable, infinite, eternal. They form a Newton’s Pendulum - visualizing the conservation of momentum.

Once activated the cocoon of the salt fists breaks open piece by piece, with every swing and reveals the ceramic knot while the salt crust falls to the floor where it remains as a relic of change. The activation is repeated weekly, each time changing the sculpture and movement irreversibly.

Five of the six fists form the Newton’s Pendulum and break and change every time the sculpture is activated. The sixth sculpture is installed after a greater gap. It is outside the system and cannot be hit by the swinging system. It remains unchanged while it formally indicated the movement.