About half of the sculptures I make these days are Mobile's. I think about them a lot. They are fascinating to watch, challenging to design (a good one), and, I think, much more interesting than they appear at first glance.
A well made mobile' is interesting to watch. It's not just some thing hanging there dangling and jangling in the wind, or some kind of fancy whirligig. A good mobile' will captivate you. Watching one can be a relaxing, soothing experience. Unlike most mechanically driven sculpture, which have repetitive, cyclical patterns of movement, Mobile's move with chaotic unpredictability. There may be a limited variety of movements but they are slightly different each time they happen.
I like the unpredictable nature of a mobile'. They are powered by the natural forces of air currents and gravity, moving in ways that, at times, seem contrary to what we, the observer, are feeling. Yet even when motionless, the mobile' is an interesting sculpture, never (or, with some Mobile's, always) resting in the same position.
Light can be an important factor as well. For most other kinds of sculpture we don't pay much attention to their shadows but for some Mobile's, their shadows add a good deal to the show. Natural or artificial lighting can be used to great advantage in this respect. Add colored glass to the mobile' and you'll get moving, colored shadows that change shape. Make a mobile' out of mirrors, and not only will you have elements that change color as the move, you'll also get a kind of Disco-Ball effect from the light reflecting off the mirrors. If the mobile' is lit by sunlight, it will look different throughout the day, taking on the color of the sunlight as it changes.
I wasn't thinking along these lines when I designed and built it, but I was watching one of my Mobile's one day when it occurred to me that what I'd done is, I made a toy for Nature to play with. I was watching wind, gravity and light play, or as I like to think, dance with the mobile'. Further pondering made me realize that everything we humans make are Nature's toys. Nature: the supreme Quality Assurance Tester. If there are flaws, she will find them.
We don't tend to think of a Mobile' as an engineering project but it is one. A mobile' is a system of linked, balanced objects. The energy in the motion of each linked and balanced section is transferred to the next section as the first one reaches the end of its range of motion, and so on through the succession of links in the chain. Or each section (or only some sections, if you choose) may have complete range of motion, so that each section (or element) is independent of each other, thereby not effecting the ones linked to them. In addition, one needs to decide if any of the elements will collide with each other. It may or may not be desirable. There are so many variables to consider along the way when designing a mobile', it can consume a great deal of thought. I've found Mobile's to be a much more interesting and deeper subject than I expected.
See my Mobile's on my Art web site: Tesserak Mobile' Page
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