Artwork
Cloud | Metéoros
Lucy + Jorge Orta, 2013
- Ref: 6100
- Materials: Resin, paint
- Dimensions: Dyptich 800 x 270 x 297cm & 600 x 230 x 280cm
- Exhibition history: 2013 Barlow Shed, St Pancras International, London, UK
- Courtesy: The Artists and HS1 Limited
- Concept: Floating amid the glass-vaulted architecture of the historic Barlow Shed, Cloud | Metéoros resembles vast cumuli populated with travellers, a ‘magic carpet’ taking passengers on an imaginary journey in the skies. It also carries a political message. The cloud calls into question the water from which it is constituted in nature to question how mankind will share this vital resource on earth.
The word meteoros is derived from ancient Greek, meaning raised from the ground, suspended, lofty, or in the midst. Clouds have long been intercessors between reality and the imagination, between heaven and earth, lightness and gravity. They inhabit the skies of Renaissance fresco paintings, often depicted crowded with laymen and prophets, angels and deities. Throughout history, this celestial vault has been a site of conviviality, of learning and exchange.
A suspended meeting place, the sky is the agora of our imagination.
On April 18, 2013 Lucy + Jorge Orta unveiled their monumental work Cloud | Metéoros at St Pancras International. As part of a new initiative titled Terrace Wires, the artists were selected to create the very first public sculpture to be suspended in the Eurostar terminal. The artwork was a cardinal welcome to the nearly one million visitors to the station each week.
