TERAPH DESK WITH CHAIR
Queen Victoria Museum and Art Gallery, Launceston
Ebonised Mahogony, Huon Pine
Teraphim, a plural Hebrew word from the Bible is thought to refer to singular objects - the plural form implying magnificence. In many English translations of the Bible it is translated to mean idols, or household god(s). The theme of the (in Lueckenhausen’s case benign) household god inserting itself into the domestic scene as a sort of guardian presence evolved as the narrative in which his Teraph series of works sits. The symbiotic duality intended by Lueckenhausen sits behind a theme of reconciliation of opposites including:
geometric against curvilinear, and often zoomorphic, form,
natural timber colours and textures against highly finished, painted or laminated surfaces,
architectonic stillness against the suggestion of movement, as in recent arrival or imminent flight.
In the Geoteraph series, table-top boxes and containers explore an easy metamorphosis between classical geometry, especially the square, circle and triangle, and zoomorphic forms with a theme of life and movement. The transition always suggests symbiosis rather than tension. In the larger tables, side tables, desks and matching chairs, the narrative usually involves a ‘mythical’ creature having landed on a constructed, architectonic form – a foreign, but not necessarily unwelcome visitor, inserting itself into the domestic environment to watch or perhaps guard. Sometimes small groups, or ‘families’ are represented.
The ‘Teraph(im)’ works present a combination of the creature crafted in highly finished natural timber and the geometric or architectonic manufactured form in painted, metal coated, veneered or ebonised MDF or timber, or in some cases , timber in contrasting colours. In some works the architectonic form references Third Kingdom Egyptian architecture. Both aspects have functional components.
