The Raft
Matthew Couper
This is one of the
sculptures
in our collection.
It was made in
Whanganui Region, New Zealand
in 2007.
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Object Detail
Media
Oil and acrylic, plaster & polyurethane, polystyrene, wood, strings and cardboard tags
Description
Matthew Couper has created a body of work that specifically responds to and mixes up the gallery’s past with art history. Figures from the Renaissance fresco painter Masaccio occupy the same spaces as Mick Jagger and Michael Jackson. Théodore Géricault’s 1819 painting The Raft of the Medusa is recalled as Couper remakes the Sarjeant’s most infamous copy – The Wrestlers – in a combination of polystyrene and plaster, drops them from a great height and then reassembles the pieces, labelled and contained on a wooden palette as though they have just arrived out of museum storage. Like the figures on board the raft of the Medusa, there is a desperation to the fragments of The Wrestlers, as there is to many museum pieces – just shards of a bigger puzzle.
Greg Donson Exhibition introduction "Museum of Inherent Vice"
Greg Donson Exhibition introduction "Museum of Inherent Vice"
Credit Line
Collection of the Sarjeant Gallery Te Whare o Rehua, Whanganui. Gift of the artist, 2010.
Collection Type
Permanent collection
Acquisition Date
May 2010
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Accession Number:
2010/3/1A-J