Crossing the Methane River
Tom Thayer
Tom Thayer, Crossing the Methane River, 2012
Paint, ink, pigments, graphite, crayon, collage on cardboard, wire, string, wood, felt, cloth
156.2 x 123.2 x 6.4 cm
The sculptures’ fragile construction and susceptibility to small breezes – even the movement of visitors to the gallery causes minor nods and swivels – demands a certain kind of engagement from the viewer: the cautious contemplation of one unwilling to disturb a creature in its natural habitat.
Callow Air’s Veil
Tom Thayer
Tom Thayer, Callow Air’s Veil, 2012
Paint, ink, pigments, crayon, graphite, sewing, felt, wire, string, cardboard, monk`s cloth
190.5 x 122.2 x 14.6 cm
Thayer’s interest is in the transformative power of visual art: found scraps of paper become lyrical metaphor, and works on the wall seem to overstep their boundaries, as though slipping between the real and imagined.
Congregation
Tom Thayer
Tom Thayer, Congregation, 2010
Corrugated cardboard, crayon, masking tape, string and wire
Dimensions variable
Crossing the Methane River
Tom Thayer
Tom Thayer, Crossing the Methane River, 2012
Paint, ink, pigments, graphite, crayon, collage on cardboard, wire, string, wood, felt, cloth
157 x 124 x 7 cm
Callow Air’s Veil
Tom Thayer
Tom Thayer, Callow Air’s Veil, 2012
Paint, ink, pigments, crayon, graphite, sewing, felt, wire, string, cardboard, monk's cloth
191 x 123 x 15 cm
Bough Geometry
Tom Thayer
Tom Thayer, Bough Geometry, 2012
Paint, ink, pigments, crayon, graphite on cardboard, wire, string, wood, tape
54 x 87 x 46 cm
Bough Geometry
Tom Thayer
Tom Thayer, Bough Geometry, 2012
Paint, ink, pigments, crayon, graphite on cardboard, wire, string, wood, tape
53.3 x 86.4 x 45.7 cm
Tom Thayer’s work is both literally light and is about the condition of lightness: birds, appropriately, are his chosen metaphor. Like the sculptor Brancusi, who made use of birds’ associative qualities – soaring, skimming, diving – as the visual correlative of the modern mind, Thayer finds parallels between his subject’s physical delicacy and a human sense of fragility and transience.
Congregation
Tom Thayer
Tom Thayer, Congregation, 2010
Corrugated cardboard, crayon, masking tape, string, and wire
Dimensions variable
Congregation
Tom Thayer
Tom Thayer, Congregation, 2010
Corrugated cardboard, crayon, masking tape, string, and wire
Dimensions variable
He has said that he aims to “isolate and extract some of our most touching qualities about being alive, and examine them for a moment.” Using corrugated cardboard loosely coloured in crayon, Thayer constructs spindly variants on birds of various kinds, suspending them from strings like marionettes.
Stillness
Tom Thayer
Tom Thayer, Stillness, 2012
Paint, ink, pigments, crayon, graphite and sewing on felt and monk`s cloth
135 x 172 x 4 cm
Text by Ben Street
