The Chaology series grew from Tess Hurrell’s fascination with the visual power of the photographed explosion. These silent and still forms are created from images of explosions caught at a point of expansion. Source material includes received images from Hiroshima, nuclear tests, the space shuttle disaster, burning oil and white phosphorus bombs. The sculptural forms are created from cotton wool, talcum powder, paint and pipe cleaners.
Chaology is about the ironic beauty of these formations: the impossible fragmented time that the camera allows, and my distance from the reality of these mediated events. The physical, creative act is an important aspect to this work, merging the contradictions of human nature: the instinct to both create and destroy.
