Castles in the Air - Research Paper Example

Inspired by the design made by Henry David Thoreau of Julian de Cordova’s nineteenth-century castle that is made of bricks, Jean Shin and Brian Ripel created their own version of the castle using tea bags they collected from the visitors of their Rooftop Tea House. The collaboration of the two artists was developed through the help of the Spanish architect Antoni Gaudi, who used strings to create three-dimensional plans of his architectural designs. Combining all these three significant individuals’ contributions to art, Shin and Ripel were able to construct their own inverted version of the castle by tying the tea bags with strings.

Installed in the original de Cordova’s mansion, which has now turned into a museum, Castles in the Air manifests a rich historical background that is not only meaningful to the artists but to the owner of the museum itself, who was a tea merchant himself. He himself was amazed at the European culture, which led to the building of the mansion. De Cordova was also fond of the idea of leaving a legacy to the succeeding generation through monuments, which people would eventually remember him of.

One distinct detail that the sculptural installations that the two artists created involve the intricately woven designs of the strings for which the tea bags hang accordingly at distinct places with appropriate numbers in each string. The light that is placed above the architecture illuminates the shadow of the inverted de Cordova mansion. With an aluminum frame that holds the entire architecture and an acrylic mirror that enhances the radiance of the strings outlining the structure of the community. Woven with two distinctive colors, the lighter one shows the elaborate structure of the mansion. The darker strings serve as the foundation of the rest of the strings from which the mansion is formed. Gravity naturally pulls the strings straight down through the tea bags, which also creates a soft shadow that looks like clouds on the floor, altogether creating a magnificent view in its entirety.