What’s the Point

At the moment of the Big Bang all matter and energy was contained at one point.

Distribute 7 dots over a grid of 42 by 56 squares. ( take an A4 sheet with grid)

The number of different possible compositions is higher than the number of seconds that have passed since the big bang.

Take some more dots, don’t make a grid, choose a space and just make a few choices.

Whats the point?

Marcus Bering’s work comprises several media combined in installations that sometimes elicit public intervention. His main tools – sculpture, drawing, video and audio are reduced to the most basic elements of form: point, line, surface. These elements are realized mostly in industrially produced standardized modules such as pipefittings, metal-wire, wooden slats, potatoes or A 4 paper.

These modules are placed in numerical arrangements or ‘constellations’ to reveal properties of light, space, time and perceptual behaviour. Bering invites us to play with this base vocabulary and its transformations.
His game is set through minimal conditions: everyday material, everyday activities: distributing, doodling, fiddling, bending, wrapping up, assembling and collapsing. Repetitive playing reveals a communication between routine solutions and spontaneous results of chance. This can be reflected in a conscious attention to basic life functions: heartbeat, breathing, muscletension, touch or physical balance.

Most of this work is in the form of ephemeral site-specific installation. By use of a larger number of modules, randomness becomes an important focal point. This can be achieved through personal intuitive placement as in the intervention of visitors of an installation, the natural development of the material used, or the results of mathematical programs.

What’s the Point

Marcus Bering

2 May- 4 June 2006
Opening Tuesday 2 May

6 to 9pm

Open by appointment:
e: exhibitions@elastic.org.uk