As part of the Fourth Plinth series of rotating public sculpture in Trafalgar Square, London, Marc Quinn mounted this large-scale work in 2005: The piece is Alison Lapper Pregnant, modeled on the artist Alison Lapper—then at eight months’ gestation—who also has a medical condition called phocomelia. The “fourth plinth” is a platform in the square … Continue reading »
Monthly Archives: May 2011
a "technology of distance"
I’m revisiting Ted Porter’s Trust in Numbers: The Pursuit of Objectivity in Science and Public Life, probably 10 years after I first read it as his student in the history of science at UCLA. Emphasis throughout is mine: My approach here is to regard numbers, graphs, and formulas first of all as strategies of communication. … Continue reading »