The extent of his production now includes a new limited edition for GEMS AND LADDERS based on his interests in the relation between form and function. The title of the edition is derived from his research into the book Underground Man by Gabriel Tarde. Originally published in 1905, the book was updated by Gillick in 2004 and is in the collection of the Museum of Modern Art in New York. Ten years on, Gillick places the utopian vision of a world beyond everyday concerns into a new form – two watch-like bracelets. Tarde’s book describes a post-apocalyptic society that has retreated underground following an ecological catastrophe, a society that now devotes itself to philosophy and art – unencumbered by work and labour, therefore no longer in need of leisure and consequently operating beyond time.
Even though we carry digital devices that create access to almost any information, and we may soon even wear this technology in glasses or embedded within our bodies, watches remain popular. Incongruously, high-quality mechanical timepieces are still prestige objects, sold as potential heirlooms. The paucity of information they communicate is of little importance. Liam Gillick has designed two different editions that have many of the characteristics of watches, both of which have larger ‘male’ and smaller ‘female’ variants. These bracelets could be placeholders for any of the small objects we hold on our persons – keys, phones, lighters or cards, say – fulfilling the need to have things to carry, yet remaining useless, indeed signifiers whose meanings will become ever less intelligible as time passes. They invite an accelerated process of historic incomprehension, and in the future may be considered, misunderstood or reinvented as if they were tribal symbols.
The first edition, A Fragment of Future History (Black) is a heavy bracelet made entirely in black rhodium plated gold; its finish is matt and dark. The shape is similar to a watch and the metal is a comparable weight, but it communicates even less. Within the bezel the face has an impressed pattern akin to the appearance of leather, though hard, unlike leather’s softness. The face is slightly rounded, inviting to the touch and, with abrasion, the black coating should slowly wear off, offering glints of yellow gold beneath and a hint of value that emerges over time.
Liam Gillick’s art work is diverse, and ranges from projects on an architectural scale to short texts published in small numbers…
