Page 55 - Studio International - September 1969

The 'Kinetic Moscow—most of which were idle and im-
penetrable—was next to impossible. What I
Construction was looking for was the basic mechanism of an
electric bell, but of a bell stronger than the
usual household one—strong enough to pro-
of 1920' duce enough vibration in a rigid rod.
I knew that there was a mechanical workshop
in the Polytechnicum Museum where appara-
Naum Gabo tus was being made for the Scientists in
Physics, and I visited that workshop and
found that some of the workmen were still
there and some work was still going on.
I asked the director and was given permission
to do my experiments in that workshop, which
was a godsend. The mechanics there knew all
the places in Moscow where old, unused
machinery was lying about. In one of them we
found an old factory bell which was not in use
because it had been replaced by a whistle.
The only useful piece of that bell, for me, was a
powerful electromagnet. To make the magnet
I think I should explain why and how it work was a simple thing—we still had electri-
happened that an engineer was asked to make city.
a replica of my 'Kinetic Construction' of1920. But the main task was to create with this a
The original work has been given to the Tate regular rhythmic wave. It was not difficult to
Gallery in London. I, being interested in the arrange a horizontal iron bar which would
preservation of that work, advised the Tate vibrate when the electricity was on, but to
Gallery that it might suffer should it be lent to join that bar with a mechanism which would
exhibitions. let a vertical steel rod vibrate demanded a
When Mr Hultén began to organize the great deal of effort and inventiveness.
exhibition called 'The Machine' for the After a lot of experimenting, what I did was to
Museum of Modern Art, he asked my per- arrange the bar in such a way that at the base
mission to allow him to make a replica of the of it were two separate springs which would
work. I gave it with the proviso that it should touch the spring on which the iron bar was
not be for sale, recommending E.A.T., with fixed. I arranged the springs in such a way
whom I was already in contact about this that together they would produce a rhythmic
particular work. standing wave, co-ordinating each other's
Mr Wittnebert tells about the process and all vibration.
the trouble which he went through—in the This was not at all simple as it sounds. I had
end achieving a satisfactory replica. Incident- to change a great many springs. I had to
ally, I think he would have succeeded sooner choose the length, strength, and elasticity of
had he not looked for other means to make the each one; I had to attach a kind of a brake to
standing wave than the one which I used the main spring on which the bar was which
originally. [ Witt Wittnebert's note is printed in would regulate the primary movement of the
`Techne'.] bar. I also had to balance out the steel rod so
It was done in a primitive way, but the only that the wave would be staying in the same
way I could have done it at that time, when dimensions and not jump out and divide itself
conditions were such that looking for elabo- into two waves.
rate mechanisms was to search for a golden I solved the problem by fastening to the rod
plate from the moon ! two balancing gadgets, one at the bottom of
This is how I did it. The standing waves had the rod and one at the top. At the bottom I
attracted my attention since my student days, made a ring, fixed into a particular point at
in particular the fact that when you look at a the base of the rod, which produced the begin-
standing wave, the image becomes three- ing of the wave. At the top of the rod, two
dimensional. In order to show what I meant small triangular pieces of plastic regulated the
1&2
by calling for the introduction of kinetic height of the wave. Later on, by choosing a Naum Gabo
rhythms into a constructed sculpture, I chose stronger steel rod, this last arrangement pro- Kinetic Sculpture (Standing Wave) 1920
Metal rod with electric motor
that standing wave as a good illustration of the ved to be unnecessary. 24¼ x 9½ x 7½ in.
idea—so I decided to construct a standing This is how the thing was made. It took me Courtesy The Tate Gallery, London
wave which would be vibrating on one fixed much more time to make it than to write,this
... The Kinetic construction presents a virtual volume,
point and rigid enough to be indeed a 'stand- explanation—in fact, it took me almost three a volume described by the speeding trajectories of an
ing wave.' quarters of a year. object ...The harmonic wave-form pattern which
Gabo's construction creates is, in spirit, if not in
One must keep in mind that the year was the When I showed it to the students, I made it physical principle, a visual echo of then recent theories
winter of 1919-1920. It was the height of civil emphatically clear that this was done by me of wave mechanics as the basis of matter. It
announced on the macroscopic level—to the few
war, hunger, and disorder in Russia. To find in order to show them what I mean by 'kine- capable of understanding the message—the essential
any part of machinery or to do any kind of tic rhythms.' This piece is only a basic example immateriality of matter.'
Jack Burnham, Beyond Modern Sculpture, 1968, Allen
work in a recently nationalized factory in of one single movement—nothing more. q Lane (London) and George Braziller (New York).