Nils Krueger: Bodies in Motion
By Nirmala Nataraj
Nils Krueger’s fabricated steel artworks teem with the sort of dualities that inevitably persist in the sculptural study of bodies in motion. While capturing the sublime essence of the proportions so integral to architecture and anatomy—in pieces that range from the prehensile rudiments of the body to the poetry of human athleticism to infinitesimal microbes swimming in a cosmic brew—Krueger’s works belie their superficially clinical preoccupations. At first glance, the pieces strike the eye in all their cool and steely majesty—as objects under dispassionate study, invested as they are in the very mechanics of being. This observation is at direct odds with the conditions necessary for the creative process, so the pieces can also be read as alchemical anomalies—comprising both coldness and immense heat, open and closed systems, and the tautly reined-in chaos of the body against the diffuse caverns of deep space. Upon viewing Krueger’s sinuous sculptures, one gets the uncanny sense of gazing upon the blueprints of an omniscient being as it puzzles over the mechanics of a seemingly unruly creation. These are forms that are both clinical and sensual, and that simultaneously convey the detached awareness of a cosmic hand and the passionate exertion of the flesh.
Krueger’s oeuvre, perhaps, appears so unaffected and lifelike precisely because his sculptures delineate the derivative movement and progression of objects through space and time. But they aren’t merely simulations of bodies in motion, but rather they seek to recreate the a priori building blocks upon which all animation and being can be built.
Krueger’s work borrows from Kant’s maxim that “the phenomena stands in opposition to the thing-in-itself.” Out of this weltanschauung, Krueger’s sculpture seeks to unearth hidden methods of perception to extract the essence of the thing-in-itself. His sculpture is a metaphor for the very experience of space and reality, those entropy-laden phenomena that expand beyond human perception.
Krueger’s exploitation of space includes two-dimensional lines and transparent planes bisecting three-dimensional media to reveal the underlying structure of order in a system that is ostensibly governed by chaos. Krueger’s intricate system of sculptural layering to reveal cross-sections of a form conveys the underlying spatial properties of the object under study, as well as its proportions, anatomy, and curvilinear properties. His brand of kinesthetic figurative representation reveals the human form in its infinite complexity and subtle physical structures, made concrete by the forces of geometry.
The body as a referent of humanity’s total experience is similar to the Renaissance humanist notion of the body as a microcosm of the universe. The concept of relating the body to harmonic numbers, proportions, perfect geometric forms, and the mathematical continuum of time and space, extends further back than the Renaissance, to the ancient Greeks. The Doryphorus (Spearthrower), a sculpture by Polyclitus, is known as “The Canon” because it embodied the correct proportions of ideal male form, which set the Western standard for the male nude image. The diagram of the “Vitruvian Man” is also visually satisfying, presenting a single point of origin and an endless expansion. It suggests the ripples created by a stone thrown into a pond, as well as the solar system’s concentric orbits—motifs that are repeatedly demonstrated in Krueger’s description of the kinetic orbit and his interest in the perspectival multiplicity of matter.
Henri Laurens defines sculpture as “essentially occupation of space, construction of an object with hollows and solid parts, mass and void, their variations and reciprocal tension, and finally their equilibrium.” Krueger’s sculptures, accordingly, involve the structured nature of space, matter, and time, in which matter is revealed as an invisible web of nuclear events with orbiting electrons and an underlying sequence to its form. Krueger’s lines are metaphors for movement, orbits that invite viewers to move around them and that illustrate the pure essence of an object’s circular movement around other bodies in space. If Krueger’s elegant forms can be perceived as experiments of space, then they are best viewed in the context of more space—as elements of one’s natural surroundings rather than curiosities under examination in a designated gallery site.
Despite his two-dimensional lines, which also trace his forms’ internal structures and underlying spatial properties, Krueger has created work in which the space of the sculpture is open and free, a metamorphosis of real space. While the idiom of mathematics is integral to Krueger’s work, the viewer’s experience of his sculpture is emotional and metaphysical, apprehended through sense rather than the thing-in-itself. It is art that seeks to proffer a knowledge of reality that is non-discursive, intuitive, and visceral. Krueger’s sculpture may be best understood as an eloquent, rigorous endeavor to make possible the experience of matter’s pure essence in a medium inherently limited by perspective.
Nirmala Nataraj is a freelance writer and editor. Her work has been published in SF Weekly, ArtWeek magazine and various online publications.
Krueger’s oeuvre, perhaps, appears so unaffected and lifelike precisely because his sculptures delineate the derivative movement and progression of objects through space and time. But they aren’t merely simulations of bodies in motion, but rather they seek to recreate the a priori building blocks upon which all animation and being can be built.
Krueger’s work borrows from Kant’s maxim that “the phenomena stands in opposition to the thing-in-itself.” Out of this weltanschauung, Krueger’s sculpture seeks to unearth hidden methods of perception to extract the essence of the thing-in-itself. His sculpture is a metaphor for the very experience of space and reality, those entropy-laden phenomena that expand beyond human perception.
Krueger’s exploitation of space includes two-dimensional lines and transparent planes bisecting three-dimensional media to reveal the underlying structure of order in a system that is ostensibly governed by chaos. Krueger’s intricate system of sculptural layering to reveal cross-sections of a form conveys the underlying spatial properties of the object under study, as well as its proportions, anatomy, and curvilinear properties. His brand of kinesthetic figurative representation reveals the human form in its infinite complexity and subtle physical structures, made concrete by the forces of geometry.
The body as a referent of humanity’s total experience is similar to the Renaissance humanist notion of the body as a microcosm of the universe. The concept of relating the body to harmonic numbers, proportions, perfect geometric forms, and the mathematical continuum of time and space, extends further back than the Renaissance, to the ancient Greeks. The Doryphorus (Spearthrower), a sculpture by Polyclitus, is known as “The Canon” because it embodied the correct proportions of ideal male form, which set the Western standard for the male nude image. The diagram of the “Vitruvian Man” is also visually satisfying, presenting a single point of origin and an endless expansion. It suggests the ripples created by a stone thrown into a pond, as well as the solar system’s concentric orbits—motifs that are repeatedly demonstrated in Krueger’s description of the kinetic orbit and his interest in the perspectival multiplicity of matter.
Henri Laurens defines sculpture as “essentially occupation of space, construction of an object with hollows and solid parts, mass and void, their variations and reciprocal tension, and finally their equilibrium.” Krueger’s sculptures, accordingly, involve the structured nature of space, matter, and time, in which matter is revealed as an invisible web of nuclear events with orbiting electrons and an underlying sequence to its form. Krueger’s lines are metaphors for movement, orbits that invite viewers to move around them and that illustrate the pure essence of an object’s circular movement around other bodies in space. If Krueger’s elegant forms can be perceived as experiments of space, then they are best viewed in the context of more space—as elements of one’s natural surroundings rather than curiosities under examination in a designated gallery site.
Despite his two-dimensional lines, which also trace his forms’ internal structures and underlying spatial properties, Krueger has created work in which the space of the sculpture is open and free, a metamorphosis of real space. While the idiom of mathematics is integral to Krueger’s work, the viewer’s experience of his sculpture is emotional and metaphysical, apprehended through sense rather than the thing-in-itself. It is art that seeks to proffer a knowledge of reality that is non-discursive, intuitive, and visceral. Krueger’s sculpture may be best understood as an eloquent, rigorous endeavor to make possible the experience of matter’s pure essence in a medium inherently limited by perspective.
Nirmala Nataraj is a freelance writer and editor. Her work has been published in SF Weekly, ArtWeek magazine and various online publications.