I have no problem with the sculpture, in fact I think it’s brilliant! (Yes, there is a pun in there.)
Come to think of it, I’ve been thinking of getting some more fish and I know how to hollow out lights bulbs… Humm…
This was on a local radio station this morning (controversy sells soap!) and it was fun to hear the few bleading heart animal lovers out there getting all pissed off because the fish are in cramped inhumane spaces. Get a life! Betta fish live in puddles and can breath through their skin so they will tolerate still water just fine. A bunch of betta owners called in to attest to this fact too. The artist feeds and changes their water with great frequency so I’d suspect that they are being treated far better than most beta fish that are on peoples desks in the bottom of a plant vase. The PETA people should go have a heavy lunch at Fuddruckers and slip into a nice meat induced food coma for a while. Were talking about fish, not children, not midgets, not prisoners of war. It’s a foodstock that is being used in a work of art. Anyway, here is an excerpt from the story:
The fish — with long, flowing tail fins — stretch from one end of their miniature containers to the other. Tiny LED fixtures illuminate each bulb from above with a blue glow that does not heat the water inside.
“The first thing that I get from most people is that it’s cruel,” said the artist, Darrell Tousley, who teaches five classes a week in the welding and sculpture studio next to the display.
But Tousley said the perception of cruelty advances the message of the sculpture.
“Sometimes,” he said, “the world we live in is cruel.”
Tousley said the light bulbs in his sculpture, titled “Pent Epiphany,” symbolize human ideas. He said ideas are alive and beautiful — like the fish — and sometimes people get trapped within their ideas.
Darrel Tousley has a webpage with photos of what was at the College of Fine Arts at Arizona State University in March of this year.
So far I can’t locate his personal home page, too bad because I’d like to see some of his other works that were mentioned in the news story.
All of Tousley’s sculptures incorporate motion in some format and usually include materials salvaged from common household items. He has built elaborate bowling ball tracks two stories high, a clay pot that flings out pingpong balls put inside and an industrial-strength kaleidoscope.
An industrial strength kalidascope? Cool! I wonder if you climb inside of it, maybe you become part of the ‘scope.
I did locate a few images of his bowling ball track.
Arizona East Valley Tribune: Sculpture lights up controversy
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art, fish, Arizona, PETA, sculpture, betta
