As an entity that watches, or guards, ‘Sentinel’ is precisely that – a sculpture that clearly references the watchtower or guardpost, even the fantastical, yet is explicitly neither. Instead, it inhabits a scale between the architectural model and the average human. The small viewing ports allow us to gaze through and between, as it gazes back at us and beyond, creating a shared experience of watching and being watched. This act is both ancient, in terms of survival and instinct, yet completely contemporary, as we inhabit a world where the limits and definitions of surveillance, observation and the private/public space are continuously debated and re-drawn.
Constructed originally and entirely from Balsa wood – the material of choice of the model-maker – ‘Sentinel’ references both intricate, pre-industrial construction and the rough-hewn defensive or observational structures of old.
However, ‘Sentinel’ is rendered in gleaming, white-patina aluminium, converting the material of pre-industry and the hand-made to a refined, contemporary medium. The surface will retain the aesthetic and distinct individuality of the original wood, yet never weather or rot. It will instead remain as is: a ‘Sentinel’.
