Мoonlight Sonata

Music has the amazing capacity to sound in all things: in space, in your heart, in lines and forms, in nature, in light and color, in stone and metal. The composition of a metal artifact sets the theme – the keynote, and the form and facture of the metal unravels and reproduces it, picking harmonious combinations of elements – chords in the chosen key. It is, however, not enough to compose a piece of music. The music has to be faithfully performed in keeping with the composer’s intent, rendering the music in its entirety unto the surrounding environment while making all the right accents, conveying the soft changes of key, conjuring up the mood the composer had intended. The great Beethoven dedicated his Moonlight Sonata to his young, beautiful pupil Giulietta Guicciardi, letting the music speak of his tender passion. The Moon has always been associated with mystery and subtle energies. Coming directly from the heart, music alone is capable of expressing the undulating waves of romance emanating from the Moon.

The Metal Workshop team presents Moonlight Sonata, a piece of wall art with a story to tell in a geometrically pristine, yes at the same time multidimensional design that appears to be comprised of 12 enchanting melodies. More than a hundred years ago, the Gestalt psychologist Max Wertheimer came to the conclusion that “the quality of the whole is different from the sum of the parts”. In any way you look at it, Moonlight Sonata proves this statement true. In terms of artistic style, it is a polyptych, or a modular panel divided into sections, an art form inherited from the Greek and Roman antiquity.

Wikipedia. Polyptych (from ancient Greek πολύπτυχος — “consisting of many folds” ← ancient Greek πολύς — “many” + ancient Greek πτῠχή — “tablet, plaque”) is a painting (usually panel painting), which is divided into sections, or panels.

This unique and unusual piece of décor is comprised of 12 geometric figures, assembled together like pieces of a puzzle to form a composition. All constituent parts of this multiplex panel were made by Brass Workshop from genuine stainless steel according to a custom process. The frontal and lateral surfaces of each section are crumpled-metal artworks of rare beauty and elegance. They look magical, as if mined from some distant lunar crater and polished to an exquisite sheen by Metal Workshop craftsmen. The distance between the sections is just enough to give each geometric shape sufficient latitude to shine, but without removing the sections too far from one another and thus violating the integral feel of the polyptych. These thin divides let the metal breathe freely and display varied waves of iridescence when viewed from any vantage point, in any lighting, spinning a different story every time. The gaps create an unseen energy bond between the component parts, allowing each to have a life of its own while being part of the dozen.

It takes consummate craftsmanship, impeccable esthetic taste, lots of savoir faire, and profound familiarity with the medium to seamlessly blend complexity and simplicity, fitting multiple potential storylines into the same art object. One needs to be able to think the way metal “thinks” in all its manifestations, every step of the creative process when birthing unique an artwork like Moonlight Sonata. The Metal Workshop team has succeeded in bringing out the simple in the complex, and the complex in the simple. Every person gazing upon Moonlight Sonata will see something special, inimitable, and magical in it that resonates with them personally.

The 12 sections of the art object Мoonlight Sonata may be interpreted as a mosaic of the year’s 12 lunations: the Moon completes 12 revolutions annually around the Earth. Like lunar terrain, each panel section reflects the play of light and shadow in space. Placed in an interior, the panel will pull you in as if by dint of multiple visible and unseen threads, mesmerizing and inducing meditation to prime you for transition to a completely different dimension. Which dimension? It’s different for everyone. The Metal Workshop masters have crafted a piece of art that is perceived differently by everyone while remaining mysteriously integral, like a painting, a multi-figured sculpture, a 3D puzzle, a panel, polyptych or mosaic. One secret of Мoonlight Sonata is that it is static, yet the undulating surface or mirror-like crumpled metal remains forever alive, dynamic, and evocative of the tongues of a cold, steel flame. The other secret is its virtual limitlessness:  on the one hand, the panel has a specific size, but on the other hand, it transcends its boundaries, irradiating subtle, invisible waves across the space.

It is easy to envision Мoonlight Sonata as an encrypted message, or 12 messages from outer space. The strange, unfamiliar code is yet to be unscrambled. Every look you take at it and every time you touch its outlandish surfaces, you feel like you’re on a journey to another galaxy, confronted by the energies of a different, unfathomable world, trying to decipher the script embedded in the metal and the fanciful shapes of the mirror-like lunar surface.  The exciting play of light, revealing the extraordinary color shades you never knew existed in the surrounding ambience, gives rise to sudden flashes of emotion, different moods, unfamiliar thoughts, and strange images on the cusp of reality and fantasy.

What makes the wall panel Мoonlight Sonata so unusual and unique is that every spectator beholding or touching it will discover something that draws them like a magnet, be it the overall shape, the pattern of the constituent sections and their wavy terrain, or the symbolism in the number of panel sections.

The number twelve has had symbolic meaning in many traditions since ancient times, deemed to represent perfection, entirety, or cosmic order. The number twelve has special significance everywhere, from world mythologies to contemporary timekeeping. There are 12 signs in the Western and the Chinese zodiac, and 12 months in a solar year. There are 12 sections on the clock face, and the minute hand moves 12 times faster than the hour hand. Twelve is one of the more controversial numbers in numerology, combining the elements 1 and 2, which canon views as mutually incompatible. Twelve may symbolize apparent force, elegant tenderness, ruthless brutality, soft femininity, defiant intolerance and earnest responsiveness. And the summative three bespeaks the gift of creativity and the ability to exert an influence on people and the ambient space.

Combining world-class metal processing technology with excruciatingly meticulous manual work, the Metal Workshop masters have presented the metal, a heavy medium by definition, in a visually light and harmonious form. Wherever Мoonlight Sonata finds a home, it will serve as a style and energy accent, reinventing the ambience as part of the artist’s gallery with a powerful center of gravity in the middle.