Erratics Net

With Caroline Munk

Peggy's Cove, Nova Scotia, CAN - 1998

A second stage of the installation Erratics Net was developed in collaboration with Waterloo architect Caroline Munk, fall 1998. The second state responds to extended times of deep fog where the air stills and the ground is soaked in vapour. Responding to this state the net can expand into multiple layers, each outward facing peak formed within a matrix layer in turn serving as the foot for an inward facing valley of the next layer.

A foam-like cellular lattice results, a filigree extending throughout the thickened atmosphere. The natural growth encouraged by this armature is froth-like, filling space with infinitesimal mass. The material is marked by regular intervals, momentarily thickening and making a porous stratified border then opening again. A striated penumbra emerges, an aura floating outward from the land. Like plankton phosphorescing in the ocean, Erratics Net offers dissociated space, an absorption into ether. In this state, the textile is organized in a pillowed form of alternating peaks and valleys, presenting barbs outward catching new material and inward for anchoring beneath. These anchors hold the net just above the bare rock, making a shallow film of still, sheltered air allowing delicate growth to emerge. The net is made with wire joints clamped by sliding flexible tubes that lock each link to its neighbour making a tough, resilient structure.