Artist Spends 9 Years Using FedEx To Ship Glass Boxes To Create Shattered Sculptures
If you’re wondering how much carriers care about the safety of your shipment, then you have to see this brilliant experiment by LA-based Walead Beshty. During a 9 year period, Beshty has been creating laminate glass objects which perfectly fit inside FedEx boxes and shipping them to various galleries and exhibitions in order to explore how works of art gather “fingerprints”.
“I was interested in how art objects acquire meaning through their context and through travel,” Beshty said in an interview with Mikkel Carl. “I wanted to make a work that was specifically organized around its traffic, becoming materially manifest through its movement from one place to another.”
Through an ordinary shipment, Walead’s pieces would inevitably crack. The curators of the galleries and exhibitions would then have to meticulously remove them for display. Each one was named after the date, tracking number, and box size of the particular shipment.
(h/t: colossal)
Art these days is like...Literally taking anything and doing ANYTHING to it, and voila! Im a muthafuckin starboy...
I have to agree, but in the experimenting, maybe they find something amazing.
normally, I'd agree with you. but this dude was pretty effing ingenious.
yeah, but he thought about it and actually went about doing it :P
Usually there's a statement behind it. For instance, the quality of the delivery service being displayed in visual way. We ship glass products at my work and switch delivery services all the time because so many of the drivers don't care and it gets really expensive to reship items. FedEx was one of the worst we worked with so I'm not surprised at all. The artist was pointing out this same thing but through visual representation. That's better in my book than hiding behind a keyboard and just saying something sucks at least.
I won't say the idea doesn't have its merits and its purposes, but to be honest... calling this "art" is like calling a youtube prank video a movie.
Tryna catch me making paintings nah Tryna make me use a pencil nah Aint got no use for those those pastels ah Been saying fuck ink and stencils yah Gonna make art that'll be unique Take a picture of some dirty feet Broken glass box gonna look real fleek Makin art don't need no paper sheet ah ahahah ah ahahah Look what you've done I'm a muthafuckin art boy
I'm an artist... and I kinda agree with you Susanna maybe this one isn't the example. But there was someone in the UK that got an art grant to live as a worm... I mean... that's taking the piss a bit.
Art has literally always been that way, it's just very likely that anybody is going to remember this particular thing that's happening right now in 5 years, 10 years, 20 years, 50 years, 500 years...
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Your point was fair until you became unnecessarily vitriolic.
I am currently working on a new project - a collection of paper cups stained with lipstick that reflect the mood of the artist as the cups are sometimes stained in bright red, discrete pink or an elegant nude. This represents the ephemeral character of the cup as a material, but the permanence of the lipsticks as it lingers in people's mind. I put a lot of thought into it and am very proud of this project - nearly as much as of the objects my cats broke and that I kept, which are soon to be exhibited at the MOMA. Yes, right...
this is SO deep yet shallow @ once....
It's art, babe. Ya know.
That's so simple yet brilliant!
😂😂
I hope the cats will be a part of your exhibition ^^
This actually sounds a hell of a lot more artistic than the glass thing. At least what you are explaining I could see having depth- what was the mood when you chose a particular lipstick? Is that a solo cup or a Dixie cup? Paper or plastic?
It's a Starbucks cup because I am ironically protesting against capitalism. Duh...
Interesting idea. Interesting result too. But I'd like to see what happens if you put the "[FRAGILE]" sign on the package.
Exactly the same. Ask my mug that arrived in 2 useless pieces even though my friend put a fragile sign on each side of the package to be sure.
Plus pack in bubble wrap or other packing material.
Fragile stickers are for the Drivers. All packages go to MASSIVE sorting facilities. Conveyor belts don't care about fragile stickers. Always pack your packages accordingly!
It would probably end up in even more pieces.
Thank you all for the info.
While I am sure that FedEx isn't too happy about this, in reality a person would have to be crazy to pack delicate items this way (unless like the artist the shipper wants them to break). From the pictures it appears that the glass has no packing between it and the box and fits snugly in the box without any foam cushions. I am sure that this was by design (i.e. the glass boxes were designed to just barely fit into the standard FedEx boxes. This is not a way that anybody should typically pack anything!
^^^^^absolutely!
Art these days is like...Literally taking anything and doing ANYTHING to it, and voila! Im a muthafuckin starboy...
I have to agree, but in the experimenting, maybe they find something amazing.
normally, I'd agree with you. but this dude was pretty effing ingenious.
yeah, but he thought about it and actually went about doing it :P
Usually there's a statement behind it. For instance, the quality of the delivery service being displayed in visual way. We ship glass products at my work and switch delivery services all the time because so many of the drivers don't care and it gets really expensive to reship items. FedEx was one of the worst we worked with so I'm not surprised at all. The artist was pointing out this same thing but through visual representation. That's better in my book than hiding behind a keyboard and just saying something sucks at least.
I won't say the idea doesn't have its merits and its purposes, but to be honest... calling this "art" is like calling a youtube prank video a movie.
Tryna catch me making paintings nah Tryna make me use a pencil nah Aint got no use for those those pastels ah Been saying fuck ink and stencils yah Gonna make art that'll be unique Take a picture of some dirty feet Broken glass box gonna look real fleek Makin art don't need no paper sheet ah ahahah ah ahahah Look what you've done I'm a muthafuckin art boy
I'm an artist... and I kinda agree with you Susanna maybe this one isn't the example. But there was someone in the UK that got an art grant to live as a worm... I mean... that's taking the piss a bit.
Art has literally always been that way, it's just very likely that anybody is going to remember this particular thing that's happening right now in 5 years, 10 years, 20 years, 50 years, 500 years...
This comment is hidden. Click here to view.
This comment has been deleted.
Your point was fair until you became unnecessarily vitriolic.
I am currently working on a new project - a collection of paper cups stained with lipstick that reflect the mood of the artist as the cups are sometimes stained in bright red, discrete pink or an elegant nude. This represents the ephemeral character of the cup as a material, but the permanence of the lipsticks as it lingers in people's mind. I put a lot of thought into it and am very proud of this project - nearly as much as of the objects my cats broke and that I kept, which are soon to be exhibited at the MOMA. Yes, right...
this is SO deep yet shallow @ once....
It's art, babe. Ya know.
That's so simple yet brilliant!
😂😂
I hope the cats will be a part of your exhibition ^^
This actually sounds a hell of a lot more artistic than the glass thing. At least what you are explaining I could see having depth- what was the mood when you chose a particular lipstick? Is that a solo cup or a Dixie cup? Paper or plastic?
It's a Starbucks cup because I am ironically protesting against capitalism. Duh...
Interesting idea. Interesting result too. But I'd like to see what happens if you put the "[FRAGILE]" sign on the package.
Exactly the same. Ask my mug that arrived in 2 useless pieces even though my friend put a fragile sign on each side of the package to be sure.
Plus pack in bubble wrap or other packing material.
Fragile stickers are for the Drivers. All packages go to MASSIVE sorting facilities. Conveyor belts don't care about fragile stickers. Always pack your packages accordingly!
It would probably end up in even more pieces.
Thank you all for the info.
While I am sure that FedEx isn't too happy about this, in reality a person would have to be crazy to pack delicate items this way (unless like the artist the shipper wants them to break). From the pictures it appears that the glass has no packing between it and the box and fits snugly in the box without any foam cushions. I am sure that this was by design (i.e. the glass boxes were designed to just barely fit into the standard FedEx boxes. This is not a way that anybody should typically pack anything!
^^^^^absolutely!