A new exhibit at the University of Kentucky Art Museum tests spacial dimensions and structure, and installing it was sometimes as complicated as it sounds.
UK architecture professor Mike McKay created the art piece, “Singularities,” that pushes the limits of what structure can do. He describes the piece, which goes on display Saturday, as a “spacial kaleidoscope,” since the piece shows the viewer different images as the viewer moves around it.
About three years ago, McKay began research on how illusion and vision affect space and can be manipulated. He has worked on “Singularities,” a project between the UK College of Design and the UK Art Museum, for a year and began seriously developing this project during his time as a MacDowell Colony fellow. The MacDowell Colony in Peterborough, New Hampshire provides “inspiring environments” to artists so they may create enduring works of art, according to the colony’s website.
McKay believes this is one of the first times that three-dimensional illusions and architecture have combined. He knows that some sculptors and many 2-D artists have experimented with illusion and space and how they can interact with one another.