White Dwarf, 2012

An Te Liu - Toronto, Canada

Sculpture

White Dwarf is a floating orb composed of obsolete domestic artifacts. Its title comes from the term given to dying stars in our galaxy – those which have lost their energy and imploded into degenerate matter. In this work, Liu creates a moribund assemblage of that which was once 'new' but now dormant and fading. Once novel, desirable, and technologically advanced, these remnants of our recent consumer past have outlived their use value, and their promises of convenience, comfort and entertainment. Here they have calcified into an inert crust embedded with familiar objects and features, spinning slowly, eventually coming to a stop.

An Te Liu’s work is included in the permanent collections of the Art Institute of Chicago and the Art Gallery of Ontario. In 2008, he was the Canada Council's Artist in Residence at the Künstlerhaus Bethanien in Berlin, and published the catalogue An Te Liu: Matter. Liu's work Cloud was featured at the 11th Venice Biennial of Architecture and installed in 2010 in Toronto at the Museum of Contemporary Canadian Art. Cloud is a recent acquisition of the San Francisco Museum of Modern Art.

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Toronto City Hall loading dock, 100 Queen Street West (Accessible from Chestnut Street at Armoury Street. Wheelchair accessible via City Hall Front Security desk.)

This project is both indoors and outdoors.