O.I.C (Oh I See)

Richard Serra’s massive installation was installed as a private loan in the ruins of the Sylvesterkapelle at Haus Weitmar in 2012. The sculpture had already been created in 1999 for the exhibition Mostra di sculture in Rome, but this location gave it an entirely new context, which had a decisive influence on the form and content.
It is a two-part work made up of identical steel blocks. The two cuboids have been placed on the same axis, but one is resting on its long side and the other is upright. As such, they look like completely different elements, suggestive of an altar and a shrine in this setting.
Within the natural stone ruin from the 14th and 15th centuries, the massive, heavy steel cubes seem simultaneously like foreign bodies from an industrial age and like immovable and indestructible symbols of a timeless eternity.
In this way, they enter a conceptual symbiosis with their location, as the church was once also erected for eternity and has now become a sign of impermanence. The ruin and the sculpture both ultimately stand for contemplation, attentiveness, and reflection on transcendence.

Additional information: www.artibeau.de/2650.htm