Metronome (2023) is characteristic of Sarah Sze’s unique approach to art making. Since the late 1990s, her innovative, poetic inquisition of the possibilities of materiality has challenged the static nature of sculpture to reflect the acceleration of information and images that define contemporary experience.

Metronome resembles an intricately illuminated globe or planetarium and is comprised of a dense matrix of thin stainless-steel tubing on which numerous hand-torn paper screens are positioned. The structure creates a framework for a dynamic display of ever-changing video images projected both onto the screens and throughout the vast gallery space, echoing the speed and transience characteristic of the age of the smartphone.

This mesmerizing installation considers our current climate in which the boundaries between the physical and virtual realms are increasingly indistinct alongside the escalating fragility of our environment. Substantial though the structure is, it is also delicate in appearance, alluding to the thin membrane of water, air, and solid ground located at the surface of our planet in which all life forms are sustained and interact and that scientists refer to as ‘the critical zone’.

“Sarah Sze seems to navigate and reshape the relentlessness of contemporary life’s visual stimuli. Her work manages to combine poetry, aesthetics, and innovation, and to give visitors the opportunity to reflect on the challenges we’re facing today: the work touches on our presence on social media, climate crisis reporting and our relationship with nature," says Museum Director Rebecca Matthews.

A consistent focus on time

Sarah Sze is internationally recognized for expanding the boundaries between sculpture, painting, video, and installation. In recent years, she has worked on a series of large-scale installations under the collective title Timekeepers, which have been exhibited internationally including at the Musée d'art contemporain de Montréal, Haus der Kunst in Munich, Fondation Cartier in Paris, and the Guggenheim in New York.

“I’ve always been interested in certain times throughout history where our relationship to the way we experience time and space in the world speeds up radically. The invention of the aero plane, the invention of the train, you see really interesting work coming out of that time, in film, visual arts and writing. We are in the middle of an extreme hurricane where we are learning to speak through images at an exponential pace,” says Sarah Sze.

Metronome is co-commissioned and produced by ARoS in collaboration with the Artangel, London and OGR, Turin and with support of Victoria Miro.

About Sarah Sze

Since the late 1990s, Sarah Sze has developed a distinct visual language that challenges the static nature of art. Born in Boston, Sze earned a BA from Yale University in 1991 and an MFA from the School of Visual Arts, New York, in 1997.

She represented the United States at the Venice Biennale in 2013 with an exhibition titled Triple Point. In 2017, Sze participated in the inaugural ARoS Triennial titled The Garden with a site-specific commission Hammock (For Rauschenberg). Her works have been exhibited at and are held in the collections of prominent institutions worldwide, in addition to a number of permanent public works across the US.

Metronome is on view at ARoS Level 1 from May 18 to October 20, 2024.

The exhibition is realised with generous support from the New Carlsberg Foundation, the Beckett Foundation, and Konsul George Jorck og Hustru Emma Jorck's Fond.

Sarah Sze, Metronome is celebrated and documented in a richly illustrated publication with texts by James Lingwood, Barbara Casavecchia, Samuele Piazza and Katrine K. Pedersen. Published by Artangel, ARoS, and OGR Torino. Available at the ARoS shop.

Press photos can be freely downloaded from Dropbox when giving due credit.