The UQAM Centre de Design is presenting Concrete in All its Forms, an exhibition of drawings and enigmatic constructions of artist and architect Mark West until April 11, 2020.
Hotel Edward Hopper Facade, Mark West 2005, graphite on paper, 29 x 36 cm Photo credit: UQAM Centre de design
Concrete in All its Forms retraces the evolution of Mark West?s work from its earliest steps in surrealist paper collages, through his invention of “automatic” drawing techniques. These drawing and collage practices are fundamental to the discovery of ideas relevant to construction, architecture, and structural design.
Mark West proposes methods for casting a new language of architectural and structural form, including flexible moulds for columns, walls, beams, slabs, and compression shells, for both pre-cast and in-situ constructions. Subway Drape Snuffle, Mark West Early 2000?s , graphite on paper, 74 x 58 cm Photo credit: UQAM Centre de design
Plaster cast, Mark West Studies of branching columns plaster casts Photo credit: UQAM Centre de design
This exhibition tells a story about the intelligence of matter and its own spontaneous eruption into form that produces a complex beauty through simple and primitive means. The scope of the work also demonstrates how creations in disparate scales, modes and materials can inform each other.
For the past thirty years, West has been pouring concrete in flexible moulds made with simple, flat, un-tailored, sheets of fabric. Replacing conven...