The Dutch artist is known for his “Nimbus” series, in which he creates perfect, fluffy clouds in unique indoor spaces: churches, castles, dungeons, and most recently, in honor of Frieze New York, NeueHouse on 25th Street. The only lasting memory of his series is singular photograph the perfect picture of the cloud in that space which Smilde and his team work to capture.
To create a cloud, it involves a very humid room, a smoke machine, and lots of mist coming out of a spray bottlee.
Smilde has been doing his “Nimbus” series for several years now, across the globe London, Germany, the Netherlands, and now, New York, just to name a few. He told us the idea came to him when, after working with installations and sculptures, he “wanted to make an image of total disappointment. Like there was nothing to see in the space it was just a cloud. Plus, he loved the duality of bringing something outdoor, indoor, as well as the duality of clouds themselves. “They can, for example, stand for the divine but also for something threatening or misfortunate,” he said. “Clouds are something really universal. Something that people give meaning to.”
“It’s true it was hard not to play the “that looks like . . .” game with each shape that appeared in the humid gallery”, said Berdnaudt. He really wants people to project their own ideas onto their work.
Mathilde Herrmann, classe A
Prep'Art English Blog 