DOUG AITKEN

ARTIST

Aitken is an artist who seems to relish the ephemeral. Arguably his best-known project is Station to Station, 2013, a train and light sculpture that travelled from New York to San Francisco, stopping in major cities along the way for installations and performances. ‘I’m not really interested in something that’s static or monolithic,’ he says. ‘I like artwork that can embrace change instead of resisting it.’ His desire for art, and indeed architecture, that responds to geographical and cultural context explains his affinity for Francis Kéré’s Slak education campus in Kenya (page 113). ‘Francis is a great example of someone who’s progressing ways to work using a material palette that is regional, and then retooling it into the future,’ he enthuses. He also singles out Studio Plastique’s tiles (opposite), which align with his ongoing ruminations on how art, architecture and design ‘should be about the entire narrative, rather than the endpoint’.

Aitken’s major solo show ‘New Era’ is at MCA Sydney until 6 February, mca.com.au, dougaitkenworkshop.com

This page, Doug Aitken photographed at his studio in Venice, California Opposite, ‘Forite’ tiles, made of recycled oven and microwave glass