Two revolutions a day

"Because of their outstanding permanence, works of art are the most intensely worldly of all tangible things; their durability is almost untouched by the corroding effect of natural processes, since they are not subject to the use of living creatures, a use which, indeed, far from actualizing their own inherent purpose — as the purpose of a chair is actualized when it is sat upon — can only destroy them." Hannah Arendt in The Human Condition in 1958.

In 2018, Sophie Nys was asked to design an artwork for a new police station in Zürich. Her proposal consisted of three parts: 12 clocks, a "wishing hole" in the wall of the building and a facade inscription predicting the exact time of the first complaint. The proposal finished second and was later partly executed and shown as Two revolutions a day. The title refers to the revolutions the hour hand on a clock makes in a full day: one for each part of the 24-hour cycle. One of the original clocks is now part of Kanal's collection.

To produce the work, Nys worked with traditional Swiss clockmakers. The orange bezels of the seemingly ordinary office clocks resemble the stripes on police cars in Zürich. Another telling detail are the black arcs marking the hours on the clockface. They are exact prints of Nys' middle finger.

In the context of the police building, the clocks refer to "time" as a measure of prison sentences: the term of imprisonment determines the period of detention, the deprivation of freedom. The middle finger calls to mind fingerprinting, a staple of police investigations, but also the raised middle finger, a familiar symbol of resistance. In the exhibition setting, the clock is not only a keeper of time, but also a metaphor for labour, the rhythm of society and the marks that time leaves on people. A sharp contrast to both clocks and works of art, which seem to exist outside of time, and untouched by it.

This work was produced in collaboration with Galerie Greta Meert.