Oscillating between truth and fiction: Sylvia Wenmackers reflects upon Alicja Kwade’s work

Sylvia Wenmackers reflects upon Alicja Kwade’s work

Oscillating between truth and fiction

As a philosopher, I enjoy marvelling at scientific models. They are intended to teach us something about reality, but to do so, they must deviate from it – omitting elements to make a process simpler and more understandable. Alicja Kwade uses similar methods in her works, which we might interpret as models of a different kind of reality.

When travelling, I enjoy visiting new science museums. They tend to be very child-orientated, with interactive displays. I’ve never lost the desire to discover nature in a playful way, although I studied physics a long time ago now. Installations with mirrors or pendulums that you can touch: what could be more wonderful?

Alicja Kwade isn’t making work for a Technopolis or museum of optical illusions. But I think it would be an interesting experiment to install one of her sculptures in such a place. Would visitors notice it immediately? Perhaps not. After all, her works are inspired by scientific models and seem robust enough to withstand a stream of active explorers. Only through sustained looking do you notice that they fundamentally deviate from our expectations of a scale model. Her solar system isn’t working as it should. It’s not so much reality itself that seems to inspire Kwade, but our models of it.

As a philosopher of science, I’m captivated by empirical models. Take those relating to weather and climate, for example: they involve mathematical equations that transform stacks of measurement data into forecasts. Other models are material objects: concrete things that you can display and possibly also pick up and rotate, such as a scale model of the solar system.

‘Superheavy Skies’, Alicja Kwade, 2022, photo: Justin Craun © Alicja Kwade, courtesy of 303 Gallery, New York

When a material and theoretical model correspond, it’s a beautiful thing. For a physicist, a simple pendulum is not just a swinging mass on a string. A scientist can instead use the pendulum as a representation of yet another periodic phenomenon. For example, the periodic way in which a swinging mass moves back and forth corresponds exactly to a molecule’s vibrations, but magnified and slowed down many times over.

Science requires an open mind: a willingness to find similarities between two unrelated processes that occur on divergent scales. This isn’t just a flight of fancy – although it is that too! – but, above all, a fantastic case of theoretical unification: the mathematical equations that determine the movement of the pendulum can be applied to all so-called harmonic oscillators, whether they are on a molecular, human or cosmic scale.

Physical models are not only useful during research, but also when teaching and communicating scientific subjects. To fulfil this role, they’re often deliberately designed to attract the public’s attention and foster understanding. Consequently, they are often beautifully made. Sometimes, their purpose is obvious (such as a scale model of a flower), while other models demand considerable academic knowledge, without which they may seem inscrutable.

It’s hardly surprising, therefore, that certain artists are inspired by scientific models. The Dadaists already used mathematical models from descriptive geometry as ready-mades. Alicja Kwade’s work is also inspired by scientific models. Unlike the Dadaists, however, she creates her own sculptures according to a quasi-scientific process.

Models are human artefacts: they’re created via deliberate interventions. Scientists consciously omit certain aspects of reality from their models, such as friction. The aim of this is to gain a better understanding of the pendulum’s motion, for example. Alongside the real pendulum, which comes to a standstill after a while due to friction, the mathematical pendulum model is established: a frictionless, non-deteriorating pendulum with a fixed period that continues indefinitely.

Exhibition view ‘Nach Osten’, Alicja Kwade, 2011, in ‘Nach Osten’, 2015, TRAFO, 2025, photo: Roman März © Alicja Kwade, courtesy of the artist — Room view ‘Nach Osten’, Alicja Kwade, 2011, in ‘Nach Osten’, 2015, TRAFO, 2025, photo: Roman März © Alicja Kwade, courtesy of the artist

The process of selection and abstraction can transcend the scientific goal: from that turning point onwards, they become artistic manipulations. Kwade’s works are no longer useful as models of reality, but by using the same imaginative and interpretive processes as scientists, it allows us to read her artworks as models of another possible world.

Finally, these creative acts by scientists and artists, such as Kwade, add something tangible to our material reality, thereby changing it. In their attempts to describe, explain and predict the world, they supplement it with new and complex objects. And this casts doubt on the feasibility of a ‘theory of everything’ or absolute comprehension. What remains is wonder.

Sylvia Wenmackers