Thin Skin The Fickle Nature of Bubbles, Spheres, and Inflatable Structures

Bubbles (and related forms) seem to be springing up everywhere lately in contemporary art. Thin Skinbrings together some of the most interesting contemporary work involving malleable, inflatable materials, including pieces by James Lee Byars, Charles and Ray Eames, Olafur Eliasson, Tom Friedman, Piero Manzoni, Ernesto Neto, Pipilotti Rist, Miri Segal and Andy Warhol. Thin Skinidentifies their current popularity as a function of two contemporary conditions: a new awareness of 'in-between' spaces, spaces neither real nor completely virtual, situations neither entirely in our control nor totally beyond it; and a new understanding of our own bodies as permeable sensors in constant osmotic exchange as they move through these spaces. An original and thought-provoking assessment of inflatables, Thin Skinproves that thinness and transparency are indeed the symbolic, and maybe even the real, skin that encase contemporary spaces and bodies.Clausen, Barbara is the author of 'Thin Skin The Fickle Nature of Bubbles, Spheres, and Inflatable Structures', published 2002 under ISBN 9780916365646 and ISBN 0916365646.