Sally K. Smith Art
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Time Machine . . . the Lansing Wheelbarrow Company Automobile Turntable

4/23/2015

 
My art studio is located in the old Charles Axel Smith garage in Berkeley. In the heart of the garage is an automobile turntable built in 1911 by the Lansing Wheelbarrow Company. This old turntable rules the garage like ancient armor. It is also full of intrigue. "What's under there?" "Where's the button?" "Can I walk on it?"  
I've recently started a series called Time Machine, based on the turntable and the garage. The Time Machine series makes use of the space and light of the garage (whether day or night), the shape and majesty of the turntable, and various patterns found in the bolting. There are many opportunities for rotating specks of light on dark and dark on light in the turntable bolts.  This mixing of specks is something I learned from Corot.
An element in some of the nocturnal Time Machines is the one foot square vent in the ceiling of the garage.  It vents all the way through the second floor where the chauffeurs used to live, and through the attic (where J. Malkovich lives), to the sky.  There is a little patch of sky available to anyone who stands in the center of the turntable.  It's as if the stars in the sky are connecting with the five center bolts of the turntable.

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  • Home
  • Handmade Charcoal
  • Political
  • Cityscapes and Landscapes
  • Burn Rate
  • Imaginary Landscapes
  • Calorie Project
  • Soot
  • California Landscapes
  • Title 16
  • Abstract
  • Figures
  • Space Between
  • Still Lifes
  • About the Artist and Contact