Fischli/Weiss
Rock on Top of Another Rock
7 March 2013–6 March 2014
Equilibres/Quiet Afternoon
7 March–7 April 2013
Sackler Centre of Arts Education at
the Serpentine Gallery
Kensington Gardens, W2 3XA
Since they began working together in the late 1970s, Swiss artists Peter Fischli (born 1952) and David Weiss (1946–2012) have become known for their transformations of the common-place and their finely-judged balance of humour and seriousness. Fischli/Weiss’s practice crosses a wide range of media, but underpinning all of their work is a spirit of discovery that encourages us to take a fresh look at our surroundings.
Rock on Top of Another Rock (2010/13) is the first public commission in the UK by Fischli/Weiss. Installed near the entrance to the Serpentine Gallery, this work comprises two large granite boulders seemingly balanced one on top of the other. Standing approximately 5.5 metres high, Fischli/Weiss’s deceptively simple gesture is incongruous and startling, and yet also in tune with its site. Rock on Top of Another Rock oscillates between stability and instability, construction and destruction. Like many of the artists’ best-known works, including the Equilibres/Quiet Afternoon photographs on display in the Serpentine’s Sackler Centre of Arts Education until 7 April 2013, the rocks are imbued with the artists’ unmistakeable wit and serious sense of the absurd.
A parallel project, commissioned by the National Tourist Routes in Norway, saw two boulders installed in the Norwegian countryside along the Valdresflya tourist route. The installation in Kensington Gardens is organised by the Serpentine Gallery in collaboration with The Royal Parks and Modus Operandi.
