A Little Serra

So between the campus parking and the Festival of Books, we came across a sculpture garden by the UCLA art department. By far the most interesting piece was T.E.U.C.L.A. ("Torqued Ellipse UCLA"),a smaller work by Richard Serra -- and by "small," I mean it was only 18 feet wide and 10 feet tall.


Serra's works frequently deceive the eye and change your perception as you walk around (and inside) them. In the head-on shot above, the piece appears to list to the left, with a straight up-and-down opening in the center. But the photo below shows that in fact the piece is more of an inverted cone, with an extreme curve to the opening.


Audry enters the sculpture. Serra's work is meant to be viewed from all sides -- especially the inside.


Being inside a Serra sculpture is a little disorienting. When we are inside a man-made structure we are used to seeing straight lines, but the walls in a Serra piece are incessantly curving toward and away from you. With no plumb lines to give the eye a vertical reference, the effect can be dizzying.


The soaring curves of these gigantic two-inch thick iron plates manage to be light and heavy at the same time. ( Each plate is fabricated at a ship-building plant.)


Here is a really interesting piece on Serra's work as seen on Google maps, including this particular sculpture.