DAVE HARDY / Definitions of plain
28.01.2016 - 05.03.2016
DEFINITIONS OF PLAIN
a level tract of country.
an extent of level ground or meadowland.
a level expanse of sea or sky.
an open space on which a battle is fought.
a level or flat surface, a plane.
a flat horizontal area.
a design, a plan.
plain cloth, a kind of flannel.
a plain knitting stitch.
an expression of pain, grief, or lamentation; plaint
free from elevations and depressions
free from obstructions or interruptions
of one’s line of sight
free from roughness or unevenness of surface \
open in behavior, guileless, frank
outspoken, straightforward, blunt
free from ambiguity, evasion or subterfuge; direct
ordinary, not outstanding, not distinguished by special qualities or abilities
simple and unpretentious in dress and manners; unpretentious
of ordinary appearance; not beautiful or pretty; homely; ugly
clearly, distinctly, openly
evelly, evenly
simply, unequivocally, absolutely
full, plenary, entire, perfect
full or complete in number or extent
complain
utter lamentations, give expressions to sorrow
tell tales, inform against
emit a plaintive or mournful sound
say in a querulous voice
—The New Shorter Oxford English Dictionary
Creating sculptures out of such materials as sheets of glass, foam, metal, cement, and various
found objects, Dave Hardy composes his sculptures’ seemingly precarious poise as an intentionally
engineered defiance of gravity. Distinguished by a constant shuttle between literal and allegorical
readings, Hardy’s artworks are both resolutely materialist and infused with a human scale and,
more precisely, a human fragility that forces the viewer to confront them as bodies in space. They
are, as Dave Hardy has written, “abandoned monuments pushing up against each other... like
bodies in an abject struggle with gravity and time.”