The pop-up sculpture is made from vellum and the images are painted with inks and egg tempera paint. It stands about 100cm high and is approximately 180 cm in length.
To briefly summarise the project: a life sized pop-up sculpture, in the shape of a telescope, satirises the relationship between two forms of government, a Republic and a Monarchy. Viewers will be able to spy through the telescope of this commentary on contemporary political life in Europe and America and follow the misadventures of ‘the King of France’.In total there are three parts to the sculpture:
1. The Scroll housed in the viewfinder
2. The pop-up in the barrel of the telescope
3. The pop-ups housed in three interchangeable end caps of the telescope.
To follow the commentary, one must move through the sculpture ‘clockwise’, so to speak. First, the viewfinder is where one should begin, and within it you will find a scroll that introduces the reader to the ‘Underlying Theme’ of the whole sculpture and is based on Machiavell’s hypothesis about the origins of socio-political culture. The scroll also introduces the reader to the main characters of the sculpture. The second section is housed inside the barrel of the telescope and is to be understood as ‘The Event’: the transformation of a Monarchy to a Republic. It depicts three key ideas of the French Revolution.
1: The Oath of the Tennis Court
2: The Storming of the Bastille
3: The Beheading of the King and the consequences of that act, such as the emergence of the Committee of Public Safety and the New King.
The third section of the sculpture is viewed through the telescope, and when you peer through the eyepiece you will see one of three pop-up ‘Future Possibilities’. The pop-up pieces are housed in three interchangeable end caps of the scope. They are based on the organisational structure of a Republic: the Judiciary, the Legislature, and the Executive.
Buy the sculpture's catalogue >
Radio Interview — Cristín Leach discusses ‘Pop-up Politics’
1 Dec 2005, RTE1: Rattlebag; the Daily Arts Review Programme
