Nick Laessing: Light | Reading

Nick Laessing’s work revisits the utopian aspirations of scientific rebels, autodidacts and amateur experimenters.

For LIGHT | READING, Laessing will explore the ‘free-energy’ movement, producing a new body of work based around experiments with the machine Prototype II (after US patent 6545444 B2 by John Bedini).

The free energy movement follows claims and inventions made primarily by the scientist Nikola Tesla at the beginning of 20th century. He thought it possible to harvest free or radiant energy from the atmosphere or aether. Since then a number of inventors have worked on his theories, and more recently the isolated work of a few individuals has found a wide following via the Internet.

Laessing’s reconstruction of a radiant energiser first built by USA inventor John Bedini will attempt to be the source of power for lighting and sound equipment used to present found radio interviews and research conducted by the artist during a one-month residency at SPACE. The main gallery will thus become a framework for entering the tacit world of these experimenters.

Nick Laessing was born in London. Following BA studies at Kingston University he gained a PGD from the Royal Academy of Art in 1999. Recent solo exhibitions include “Nick Laessing” Arcade, London (2009), “Nick Laessing”, Arquebuse, Geneva (2007), “Nick Laessing”, Mary Mary, Glasgow (2005).