Magnus Celestii
Magnus Celestii was conceived dually as a functional desk for an artist and also as an immersive sculpture. It was designed for a temporary exhibition at the Artists House of the New Art Centre, Roche Court.
The first in the Magnus series of large-scale sculptural works, Magnus Celestii is an exploration of the relationship between form and function as it is entwined with the viewer’s experience: enticed to move around, to see and engage with the piece from different perspectives.
Emerging from a desk in the centre of the room, the free-form sculpture spirals upwards and outwards to enfold the entire space. A large wall-mounted sculptural shelf reaches towards the spiralling desk from an opposite wall.
- Year designed: 2014
- Materials: Olive ash
- Finish: White oil
- Dimensions: 3000 x 3850 x 5700mm
- Edition of: Unique
About the Magnus series
"Magnus is a drawing in air, an idea – an emotion expressed through form that is serene or complex, created to engage with us in a physical and intuitive way." Joseph Walsh
The title Magnus, from the Latin for large or great, reflects the scale and presence of these sculptures which encircle the viewer and redefine the architecture of the spaces for which they are designed.
The series represents a challenge in innovation to transpose Joseph Walsh’s approach to material and form from the intimate scale of an object to hold in the hand to the monumental scale of an object to stand within. The grace and flow of the finished forms belies the complex process from sketch models to design development, prototyping and engineering through which they have been realised.
