Gabriel Dawe

Plexus A1, 2015, Thread, painted wood, and hooks, 7.62 x 3.65 x 12.19 m, Site specific installation at the Smithsonian American Art Museum's Renwick Gallery; Courtesy of Talley Dunn Gallery; Photo: Ron Blunt

Closer to the Transcendent

Commentary by Richard Stemp

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Read by Ben Quash

There can be something magical about seeing a rainbow. This is surely because we are looking at something that is not there, a trick of the light, which—coming from behind us, refracted and reflected through droplets of water—allows us to see its different colours. However, Gabriel Dawe’s Plexus A1 is a double bluff, the illusion of a rainbow, created by solid matter—seemingly endless lengths of coloured thread. The immaterial is revealed to us as reality.  

As Dawe himself says, ‘When you see a rainbow in nature you get a glimpse of the order that exists behind nature’ (Ault 2015). While he is referring to the laws of physics, the way in which the visible rainbow reveals these invisible truths parallels John’s vision of heavenly truth as it is manifested in our visible world. 

Plexus A1 was created for an exhibition at the Renwick Gallery of the Smithsonian Museum in Washington DC in 2015. The exhibition was entitled Wonder—and a response of wonder is elicited by the sheer scale of Dawe’s work. In some ways, such a response is analogous to that inspired by the description of the heavenly throne in Revelation, which evokes the splendour of precious gemstones, the sublime terror of lightning, and the ‘magic’ of the rainbow.

Dawe’s installation is one of a series that takes its title, Plexus, from the network of nerves, blood, and lymph vessels which link the various parts of the human body. According to the artist, the title further refers ‘to the connection of the body with its environment. It also relates directly to the intricate network of threads forming the installation itself’ (Dawe ‘Density’).

Dawe believes that too many people are unaware of our interdependence with nature, and as a result are in danger of ‘killing everything into the ground’ (Ault 2015). There is an increasing fear that the world as we know it will end as a result of climate change, and humankind’s own actions.

Revelation’s rainbow throne (in its echo of Genesis 9’s rainbow) offers a sign of promise even in the face of impending destruction.

With the ‘wonder’ of Plexus A1, Dawe hopes to ‘offer the viewer an approximation of things otherwise inaccessible to us—a glimmer of hope that brings us closer to the transcendent, to show that there can be beauty in this messed up world we live in’ (Dawe ‘Density’).

 

References 

Ault, Alicia. 2015. ‘Artist Gabriel Dawe Made a Rainbow Out of 60 Miles of Thread, 17 November 2015’, www.smithsonianmag.com, [accessed 28 May 2023]

Dawe, Gabriel. n.d. ‘The Density of Light’, www.gabrieldawe.com [accessed 30 May 2023]

See full exhibition for Revelation 4:1–11

Revelation 4:1–11

Revised Standard Version

4After this I looked, and lo, in heaven an open door! And the first voice, which I had heard speaking to me like a trumpet, said, “Come up hither, and I will show you what must take place after this.” 2At once I was in the Spirit, and lo, a throne stood in heaven, with one seated on the throne! 3And he who sat there appeared like jasper and carnelian, and round the throne was a rainbow that looked like an emerald. 4Round the throne were twenty-four thrones, and seated on the thrones were twenty-four elders, clad in white garments, with golden crowns upon their heads. 5From the throne issue flashes of lightning, and voices and peals of thunder, and before the throne burn seven torches of fire, which are the seven spirits of God; 6and before the throne there is as it were a sea of glass, like crystal.

And round the throne, on each side of the throne, are four living creatures, full of eyes in front and behind: 7the first living creature like a lion, the second living creature like an ox, the third living creature with the face of a man, and the fourth living creature like a flying eagle. 8And the four living creatures, each of them with six wings, are full of eyes all round and within, and day and night they never cease to sing,

“Holy, holy, holy, is the Lord God Almighty,
who was and is and is to come!”

9And whenever the living creatures give glory and honor and thanks to him who is seated on the throne, who lives for ever and ever, 10the twenty-four elders fall down before him who is seated on the throne and worship him who lives for ever and ever; they cast their crowns before the throne, singing,

11“Worthy art thou, our Lord and God,

to receive glory and honor and power,

for thou didst create all things,

and by thy will they existed and were created.”

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