FAD Magazine

FAD Magazine covers contemporary art – News, Exhibitions and Interviews reported on from London

Pocket a work by Turner Prize winner Richard Long

richard_long_tube_map_cover
Acclaimed British artist Richard Long has designed the next Pocket Tube map cover for Art on the Underground, which customers can pick up at Tube stations for free from September.

The work, entitled “Earth”, shows the different colours of the Tube lines stacked on top of each other, with the black grid between them referencing the Northern line. Long echoes the format of an I Ching hexagram symbolising ‘Earth’, a figure composed of six stacked horizontal lines from the ancient Chinese Book of Changes. The philosophies of the I Ching recur in Long’s work; his current show at Tate Britain opens with two dramatic hexagrams representing Heaven and Earth, from which the exhibition takes its title.

The choice of the Earth symbol for the Tube map is an obvious one for Long, whose work always involves an exploration of the earth’s surface, time, distance, geography, measurement and movement. These connect with the I Ching’s ideas about the dynamic balance of opposites, the evolution of events as a process, and acceptance of the inevitability of change.

“Earth” will give passengers a chance to think beyond their fast-paced London journeys. The Art on the Underground Programme can offer passengers a moment of contemplation while travelling across the Capital.

Tamsin Dillon, Head of Art on the Underground, said: “I am very impressed by Richard Long’s approach to this Tube map cover commission, his combination of the Tube line colours with the I Ching will be compelling food for thought for our customers.”

Responding to the recent Richard Long print giveaway by Art on the underground one Tube customer, said: “It takes you away from your day to day world and delivers you to another, to your imagination” while another customer said: “it brings a little magic to the commute…”.

Categories

Tags

Related Posts

FAD magazine Migrate Art_Scorched Earth_Anish Kapoor_

Migrate Art announces ‘Scorched Earth’

Migrate Art presents ‘Scorched Earth’ a charity auction and exhibition of new works by leading artists, organised in direct response to the widespread deliberate destruction of crop fields in Iraq. The participating artists have created new works using paint pigmented with ash collected by Migrate Art from land scorched by these fires.

Trending Articles

Join the FAD newsletter and get the latest news and articles straight to your inbox

* indicates required