Details

Title

Stellarator Wendelstein 7-X Detail, Max Planck IPP, Greifswald

Artist/Maker

Thomas Struth (German, born 1954)

Date

2009

Medium

Dye coupler print

Dimensions

64 1/4 x 83 5/8 x 2 3/8 inches

Credit

Purchase with funds from the H. B. and Doris Massey Charitable Trust

Accession #

2010.241

On View

Currently not on view

Thomas Struth’s most recent series takes the viewer deep into normally inaccessible industrial and scientific territory. Created throughout Asia, Europe, and the Americas, the images record the structural intricacy of remote techno-industrial and scientific research spaces, such as physics institutes, pharmaceutical plants, space stations, dockyards, and nuclear facilities. "Stellerator Wendelstein 7 X Detail Max Planck IPP, Greifswald, Germany," a photograph taken within a German nuclear facility, exemplifies the element of abstraction that dominates many of Struth’s depictions of high-tech subjects in this series. The forms and functions presented for study are not readily decipherable without the aid of a descriptive label; the overwhelming mix of metal and wire presented in such a monumental scale inspires visual wonder of the technological realm. The work points to the intricacies of scientific inquiry and illustrates how innovation can manifest itself as a visual record of the unfathomable.

Image Copyright

© (c) Thomas Struth

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