Orrery | Greg Payce

Solo exhibition "Orrery" by AUArts Professor Emeritus Greg Payce consists of 24 ceramic vessels arranged on a mechanized platform that rotates the rows of sculptures imitating the movement of celestial bodies.

Solo exhibition "Orrery" by AUArts Professor Emeritus Greg Payce contains 24 ceramic vessels arranged on a mechanized platform that rotates the various rows of sculptures and imitates the movement of celestial bodies. The rotation of these vessels in the fashion of planetary orbits animates the negative space between the sculptures revealing the general profiles of men and women as they turn.

The title, “Orrery”, references the popular astronomic mechanical model used to represent the positions, motions, and phases of the solar system. Here, the artist has borrowed the circular, mobile aesthetic of a traditional orrery and adapted the functional mechanized elements to rotate his ceramic pieces in a way that animates the negative spaces between the vessel’s forms. The spatial profiles between each of the twenty-four carefully aligned vessels reveals the outline of male and female bodies in place of the solar planets.

This small exhibition is a recent acquisition donated by Payce into the Winnipeg Art Gallery's permanent collection.