Invariant Interval, 2013

Commissioned by the Visual Arts Center in the Department of Art and Art History at the University of Texas at Austin

Stainless steel wire, aluminum collars, silvered glass beads
20 ft h x 16 ft w x 15 ft d (609.6 x 487.6 x 457.2 cm)

All photos by Ricky Yanas and Sandy Carson

Within spacetime, the separation between two events is measured by the invariant interval between the two events, which takes into account not only the spatial separation between the events, but also their temporal separation.

Invariant Interval is shaped by gravity, the specific interval structure (created with the aluminum collars), and the material properties of the steel and glass beads. The sculpture is also about the physical process of expansion. The sculpture starts out as a flat object, and expands out to it's final form creating a large volume with very little mass.