M_onthly A_rt R_eview

issues #4
May 2009




The Endless Column

In the year 1934, Romanian sculpture Constantin Brancus was asked to make a monument in the memory of the heroic acts of the good people of the Gorj county of Romania, and especially for the resistance of the population of Târgu Jiu, from the time of World War 1. The artist always wanted to do something “for the county”, so he accepted the commission filled with enthusiasm, considering this a very important step in his growing career.

That was when the Sculptural Ensemble of Constantin Brâncuşi from Târgu Jiu was born. The Ensemble, formed from three sculptures — The Table of Silence, The Kiss Gate and The Endless Column — lies on an axis 1,275 meters long, oriented west to east. Each of these wonderful and unique sculptures have a certain meaning, representing three of the most common, but most sacred aspects of the human life.

The Table of Silence, made from limestone, is just what the name means – a table of silence. The twelve chairs sculptured in the form of a sandglass represents the passing of time. Twelve – twelve months of the year, the twelve hours that appear on everybody’s clock and wristwatch, twelve cranial nerves, twelve zodiac signs – the number that cannot escape any man. Yes – there are twelve chairs that represent the mortal life of an, but chairs that are there because of a table – a silent table, but a table that gives the chairs a meaning, a reason to exist. Originally the twelve chairs were much closer to the table and were arranged in pairs. The reason why it was like that remains a mystery.

The Kiss Gate of Banpotoc travertine (marble), features a kiss motif on the gate pillars. The entire structure is supported on a steel axle, set in a concrete foundation of five square meters. In plain English … that means we’re talking about one big rock that will make you scream “Stonehenge!”. But unlike Stonehenge, the stone we are talking about doesn’t poses such a big secret. The Kiss Gate represents another motif of the human life: love. The bond between a man and a woman represented threw a kiss, a secret and pure act that represents the bonding between the two, as well as the continuation of our kind. Because, if not from love, then from what can we be born?

And finally, The Endless Column. This particular idea has obsessed Brâncuşi from the very beginning. At first it was a simple wooden sculpture, nothing special from his other works, but soon, he started to see certain thing. It was a column, of course, but it was special. Because of its simple yet complex design, the construction was special. It has no real base, no beginning and no ending – an Endless Column. It was the perfect symbol for the Ensemble – the symbol of man’s infinite sacrifice, as Sydnei Geist considered it. Today it represents the peak of modern art, a “spiritual will” of the artist, a true axis mundi of our time.

That whole thing concerning the axis mundi must have lost you a bit, right? Well, I guess it’s about time I explain a bit what I was meaning by that.

According to Wikipedia, the axis mundi (also cosmic axis, world axis, world pillar, columna cerului, center of the world) is a ubiquitous symbol that crosses human cultures. The image expresses a point of connection between sky and earth where the four compass directions meet. At this point travel and correspondence is made between higher and lower realms. Communication from lower realms may ascend to higher ones and blessings from higher realms may descend to lower ones and be disseminated to all. The spot functions as the omphalos (navel), the world's point of beginning.

After Brâncuşi received the all-clear signal from his commissioner (namely Aretia Tătărescu who financially supported the artist from the very beginning of his project) to add the Column to the Ensemble, the artist started his work. The Endless Column from Târgu Jiu – the complete and finished work - is 29.33 meters (96.23 ft) high and composed of 17 rhombus-shaped modules made out of cast iron. (Top module, no.17, is only a half-module). This might mean the continuation of it all beyond the sky, somewhere further then even our imagination can ever take us. It became a pole binding the sky and the earth, just like marriage binds the lives of a man and a woman till the end of their life.

The modules were made in the central workshop of Petroşani, assembled under the engineer Ştefan Georgescu-Gorjan, and completed on October 27, 1938.

From Brâncuşi’s point of view, the Endless Column was the perfect homage to the Romanian heroes of the First World War – a symbol of man’s endless struggle in life as well as his ability to see beyond what we can see with our eyes. The artist planned many other projects for his country, but given the times he lived in, none were able to be turned into reality.

In the 1950s, the Romanian communist government considered Brâncuşi's art an example of "bourgeois" sculpture and planned to demolish it, but the plan was never executed. It was restored between 1998 and 2000 through a collaborative effort of the Romanian Government, World Monuments Fund, the World Bank and other Romanian and international groups.

Many of you may believe modern art to be nothing but some material randomly shaped to make something that may tell you something, and I am not going to say anything against that. Art is art no matter how you see it, but each real artwork has something to tell you. If you look, and I mean really look, you might discover that even a rock can tell you stories about the man that made it that way, about what was in that man’s mind and heart when he made it the way it is, and maybe, just maybe, you might – threw that rock – be able to tell what kind of a man the artist was. But nether the Table of Silence, or the Kiss Gate, and definitely not the Endless Column are simple rocks – they represent the spirit and the beliefs of a man, one that if could not become an artist, could have become a philosopher.

- CONCLUSION -

If born in a different time, I am sure that the Sculptural Ensemble from Târgu Jiu would not have been the only one sculpture Constantin Brâncuşi would have offered Romania, as well as the world, but we must be contempt with the little he has given us, and we must learn to treasure them – not because they were made by a now famous modern sculpture, but because they have meaning, and they have a message for humanity.

As Mircea Eliade observed: "Every Microcosm, every inhabited region, has a Centre; that is to say, a place that is sacred above all."


_{[I wish to thank the people of Wikipedia.com as well as all the critics, reviewers and many more for publishing the information I have used to create this article]}

The Saatchi Gallery is making a top 500 artists of the 20th century. Brâncuşi is already rated 17 :3 If you are a fan of Brâncuşi's works, then please take your time and vote for him and maybe we can get him into the top ten! --> [link]

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