NEW STILL LIFE – Tapio Haapala

NEW STILL LIFE

At first, there was a handle. The idea came to me when I saw an old, locomotive-shaped handle, detached and lying around. It was dented and patinated from years of touch. It was no longer attached to anything that could be opened or carried. It had lost its original purpose, freed from its function.

The form and idea intrigued me enough that I first incorporated the handle into a sculpture project, then later created a larger version for an exhibition at Rauma Art Museum. To emphasize the handle as a symbol of dysfunction, I suspended it from the wall in a half-loose position, hanging by a single remaining fixture. That’s how I came up with Screws.

At first, I made just a few Screws—only what was needed to attach the handle: one to hold it on the wall, three lying loose on the floor, detached from their fastenings. Then, more Screws began to appear, almost spontaneously. I started seeing this single, insignificant component in a new light—as a symbol of the small contributor’s role within a larger whole.

I even began to notice unique features in the Screws, almost like fingerprints, replacing the usual Torx and Phillips head designs. And then I saw something else: Screws have a spiral structure—just like DNA, though only a single helix. I experimented with different coloring methods, cast Screws together into absurd formations, and sought the essence of non-functionality. Under my treatment, a basic technical component had taken on new qualities and proportions, but in doing so, it had also lost the very function it was originally designed for. These Screws certainly wouldn’t hold anything together.

A large pile of Screws became the focus of installation experiments. I also noticed the emergence of an intriguing shadow world, shifting the work toward immateriality. Growth, the relationship between weight and lightness, and the connection between the individual and the whole—perhaps that is what this is all about.

Translated with ChatGPT