Archi Blog 1: Device to Root out Evil

Artist: Dennis Oppenheim

Location: Vancouver\ Calgary (Canada)

First installed in Vancouver, BC, Canada and later relocated to a park in Calgary, Alberta, the 25-ft tall, aluminum framed, red glass shingled “Device to Root Out Evil” was designed by American sculptor Dennis Oppenheim, who says that “Turning the church upside down makes it more aggressive, but not blasphemous.” Though commissioned by the President’s Panel on Art, the president of Stanford University rejected the sculpture because it was “not appropriate” for the campus. Oppenheim says that "That piece, initially called Church, was proposed to the Public Art Fund in the city of New York to be built last year on Church Street, where I live. The director thought it was too controversial, and felt it would stimulate a lot of negative reaction from the Church and the religious population. I then changed the title to "Device to Root out Evil", to sidestep unwanted focus on ambient content. It's a very simple gesture that's made here, simply turning something upside-down. One is always looking for a basic gesture in sculpture, economy of gesture: it is the simplest, most direct means to a work. Turning something upside-down elicits a reversal of content and pointing a steeple into the ground directs it to hell as opposed to heaven."

Galvanized structural steel, anodized perforated aluminum, transparent red Venetian glass, and concrete foundations, 22 x 18 x 9 ft, the large scale sculpture was first exhibited at the 1997 Venice Biennale, in the form of an upside down church, with its steeple buried in the ground the work is a clear remark on religion. The sculpture was later moved to a public park in Vancouver, Canada as part of the Vancouver Sculpture Biennale in 2005. Unsurprisingly, the public had mixed a mixed reaction to the work and the Vancouver public parks committee voted to remove the sculpture. The Glenbow Museum in Calgary, Canada jumped at the opportunity to display the sculpture, which will arrive in a week or so. The piece was previously rejected by Stanford University in 2004. The Glenbow Museum placed the sculpture in Ramsay, Calgary’s most creative neighbourhood where it has been enjoyed, engaged and celebrated ever since.