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TOM SACHS
SPACESHIPS
ART SHOW /.
Oct 7 - Nov 26
18 E. 79TH ST.
NEW YORK, NY 10075
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Acquavella Galleries is pleased to present its third exhibition with New York-based artist Tom Sachs. Titled Spaceships, this group of new and recent sculptures and paintings will be on view at Acquavella New York, opening on Oct 7.
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In this exhibition, Sachs investigates the accepted understandings, assumptions, epistemology, and consensus of what constitutes a spaceship. By tracing its evolving historical and linguistic understanding, the artist explores a spaceship’s physical, metaphysical, and spiritual possibilities. Sachs offers the formal criteria defining a spaceship as an object that has the ability to move us from one state to another. In its most commonly understood form, a spaceship takes us from the dimension of earth to space. Sachs challenges this narrow definition and investigates vessels that can also metaphysically and spiritually transport. From Sachs’ perspective, the guillotine—in addition to its primary function—is a transportation device, as it takes a person from life to death, or the afterlife. A cathedral or a place of worship is a spaceship, as are our bodies, which, at their most fundamental, are metaphysical spaceships—multidimensional organic vessels that carry our genetic code.
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Tom Sachs explains, “There are three reasons people do anything— spirituality, sensuality, and stuff. Spirituality is asking the big questions: Are we alone? Where do we come from? Sensuality is going where no man has gone before: exploring space, the g-force of excitement, climbing the highest mountain, the smell of the tatami, the touch of the kimono… Stuff is the hardware: a spaceship, a cathedral, a tea bowl. That’s what we make. Our priority is sculpture, but it doesn’t mean shit without the ritual and without the spirituality and the reasons behind it. You’ve gotta have all three.”
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For more images and INFORMATION CLICK HERE.
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CREDITS
TEXT: AQUAVELLA
ILLUSTRATION / Photos: TOM SACHS