Steve Rowell

Shock + Awe
2006

In collaboration with SIMPARCH

For Year_06 (one of the alternative fairs during Frieze Art Fair in London), SIMPARCH made a garden trellis using electrified cattle fencing to support the artificial English ivy they brought from the U.S.A [made in China]. The trellis took the shape of the B-2 “Spirit” stealth bomber and defined a more intimate zone within the large courtyard of the Mary Ward House. A B-2 stealth aircraft is the latest remote deployment vehicle for dropping up to 40,000 pounds of weapons anywhere on the planet undetected. SIMPARCH’s spatial rendering of this ghostly and rather sinister form has been grounded and given a human touch — harmless, save for a startling shock if one dared to come in contact with it.

The audio component of the work was created by me. It utilized a Shepard Tone as the primary element of the composition. The Shepard Tone provides an ambient sound illusion of a continually falling pitch.