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Untitled: DIE (2001) is a response to Minimalist sculptor Tony Smith’s iconic closed volume sculpture also entitled DIE (1962). For a commission at Arnolfini Gallery McKenzie became interested in exploring Smith’s assertion that DIE ‘is a geometric, abstract equivalent of man’. The original piece of sculpture made by Smith was 6ftx6ftx6ft. McKenzie re-fabricated this sculpture in plywood but this time built it according to the length of his own body; 6.3ftx6.3ftx6.3ft. It was painted white, (mirroring the white cube of the gallery) and set upon a white floor. During a four-day period McKenzie graphited over each of its surfaces, pushing the cube around the gallery leaving traces of graphite across the floor and walls. This work fascinated McKenzie as it asks us to think of this piece not in terms of architectural form but as an actual person, anthropomorphism being placed at the very centre of our understanding of this object. It is the relationship of Minimalism to the body that McKenzie wanted to explore. |
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