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Two New Installations by Faculty Created for Exhibition at Lille3000

Two New Installations by Faculty Created for Exhibition at Lille3000

Assistant Professor of Architecture Catie Newell was selected to create a new installation, Dead Wire, as part of Lille3000, a cultural program held in the city of Lille, France. This year’s Lille3000 city-wide triennial is focused on works from five cities throughout the world: Rio, Detroit, Eindhoven, Phnom Penh and Seoul. With the assistance of the Museum of Contemporary Art Detroit, Lille3000 selected and commissioned artists, designers and architects from Detroit to participate in an exhibition about the Renaissance occurring in their city. Selected participants created new works for the Gare Saint Sauver, the city of Lille’s old train station. The success of Newell’s Dead Wire project launched an invitation for a second installation, Avialae, done in collaboration with Wes McGee and Aaron Willette.

Newell describes Dead Wire as a spatial interruption into the extensive copper wire scrapping industry of Detroit. Copper is a precious and valuable metal in Detroit, with the growing scrapping industry bringing detriment to both public and private services as wiring is stolen from businesses, houses and street lights. Dead Wire configures copper wire which has been scraped, stripped and twisted to create the installation, suspended in the air to represent the electrical lines in the city. Dead Wire was created with the assistance of Lindsey Petersen, Joe Proper, Dan Sebaldt, and Carolyn Newell. 

The second installation, Avialae, references bird wings and extinct avian creatures in form. Suspended above the old train tracks of Gare Saint Sauveur in France, the glass installation is lit from above to create a kaleidoscopic effect on its surroundings. Avialae was constructed through a process of free form catenary slumping, where each piece of the work is subjected to its own temptation and duration setting to provide variation in curvature and detail. Avialae was a collaboration between Assistant Professors of Architecture Catie Newell and Wes McGee, and Lecturer in Architecture Aaron Willette with the assistance of Joe Proper, Dan Sebaldt, and Lindsey Petersen. 

For more information on Lille3000 and the Renaissance exhibition, visit: http://renaissance-lille.com/pages/ville-detroit
Dead Wire: http://www.cathlynnewell.com/Dead-Wire
Avialae: http://www.cathlynnewell.com/Avialae