Ulysses by James Joyce, a book dense with detail, rich in character, rooted to place. Joyce once declared that if Dublin “one day suddenly disappeared from the Earth, it could be reconstructed out of my book.”
A city, a point on the globe, brought to life in a continuous stream of consciousness. Characters that are entirely of Dublin, but yet resonate globally.
Dublin can be found on any globe, large or small, at 53° Latitude and 6° Longitude. The entire Odyssey of Leopold Bloom takes place between Martello Tower Sandycove and 7 Eccles Street Dublin City. A distance of only 14 km.
Bloom’s journey through Dublin in June 1904 can be marked, chapter by chapter, as sets of latitudinal and longitudinal locations.
This data, combined with the chapters of Ulysses, is combined to make a series of 18 Episodes, each expressed as a 3 dimensional volume.
The overall volume of each sculpture is a result of a series of calculations based on the geographic coordinate data specific to each chapter.
Apertures: Each sculpture contains 53 Latitudinal apertures (horizontal) and 6 Longitudinal (vertical) apertures.
Insertions: Each sculpture contains volumes representing important characters in each chapter.
My work TELEMACHUS explores the broad sweep of this epic novel in 18 individual sculptures. Each work is a chapter specific, data generated work, capturing the time, place, and people that inhabited Dublin on June 16 1904.
Available in Patinated Bronze and Gold Leaf.
Paul D Harrison 2021