A Dice Throw, 18th Sept 2014: Heisenberg’s Uncertainty Principle cast into the Firth of Clyde (2014), commissioned by Talbot Rice Gallery
Being & Time: A copy of Heidegger’s Being & Time is thrown into
the Abyss, Grand Canyon, Arizona (2012), first exhibited at Talbot Rice Gallery 2014
Conrad’s Hand: X-rayed hand of Joseph Conrad with Letter to Edward Garnett, 29th Sept 1898 (2014), commissioned by Talbot Rice Gallery

Works exhibited in Counterpoint, Talbot Rice Gallery, Edinburgh (2014), a group exhibition as part of Generation: 25 Years of Contemporary Art in Scotland

Referencing the referendum vote on Scottish Independence on 18 September 2014. A large scale 3mx4m wall text installation stated that on this date I would cast Werner Heisenberg’s uncertainty principle into the Firth of Clyde. The work also involved a performance/action a process which included acid etching Heisenberg's equation into a copper bar, documented on still and video and throwing it into the waters of the Firth of Clyde from a small passenger ferry.

The gesture of throwing was echoed a short video work, Being and Time, a site-specific performance work as part of the ongoing Envoy series (see related RADAR entries). In this work, a copy of Heidegger's Being and Time (in which the philosopher asserts that we are 'thrown into being') is cast into the Grand Canyon in Arizona. The spot in the Grand Canyon where the work was performed is known as the Abyss.

Conrad's Hand. A work designed for the Anatomical Museum of the University of Edinburgh. The work consisted of a 1m lightbox which held an acetate copy of the X-ray of Joseph Conrad's Hand by John MacIntyre, who owned the first X-Ray machine in Scotland alongside Conrad's Letter to Edward Garnett, 29th Sept 1898 where he recounts the evening when the X-Ray was performed by MacIntyre. From the letter it is apparent that the first X-Ray performed in Scotland was of the writer Joseph Conrad's hand.

These works explore art as performative symbolic or political gesture. They each play on the resonances of the gesture of throwing and casting in political and philosophical contexts, on casting a vote into the future of your country and being cast into the void. They also invite the parallel of art with the ritual economy of gift exchange in the potlatch. The X-Ray hand of the writer Joseph Conrad relates to a series of works which look at the notion of virtuosity embodied in the hand of the artist, which involved casting the hand of a classical violinist and the hand of the Italian philosopher Paolo Virno (2011), whose writings on virtuosity and labour informed the critical context of the work.