Playing with viewer's expectations and challenging established modes of perception, the American artist Richard Artschwager combines pictorial and object forms in order to make the comprehension of space and objects that occupy it strangely unfamiliar. The conceptual work of Artschwager escapes easy classification. While the use of utilitarian objects, industrial materials or bright colours, central to his work, has tied his practice to Pop art, the geometric nature, solid presence, and the work's detachment from traditional modes of representation have linked his work to Minimalism and Conceptualism.

- War (swivel), 2002
presents a simple arrangement of two stacked box-like objects, each laminated with black and white photographs of a male and a female bust - Artschwager's children. Mounted on two level - head and shoulders - swivels, that can be rotated independently, the work's construction allows for the figures to be viewed from all sides, creating a sense of animation. Randomly different parts of the heads meet and greet or repel one another in a flashing metaphor of monogamous engagement. The couple's middle-aged faces and nude shoulders exude vintage sexuality and a mature consciousness, that are at once strong and deeply fragile. The work confronts domesticity representations, also highlighted by the domestic nature of the work's table base, linking the work to Artschwage's previous practice. Artschwager has studied chairs and furniture in his work since the 1960s, as a way of exploring problems of spatial perception and traditional functions of furniture. Used as a conceptual tool and a simultaneous support structure, - War (swivel)
explores the finite difference between psychic projection and reality, challenging thus established modes of perception and spatiality.

MC