Revolving Torsion

About

Revolving Torsion is a 1972–73 kinetic sculpture and fountain by the Russian-born Constructivist artist Naum Gabo. It was commissioned for the Tate Gallery and has been on long-term loan to the Guy's and St Thomas' Charity for display at St Thomas' Hospital in Lambeth, London, since 1975. It was given Grade II* listed status in January 2016.

The sculpture is the culmination of an idea that Gabo developed in the mid-1920s to implement the ideas published in his 1920 Realistic Manifesto. He made a series of models and maquettes over the years, including his work of c. 1929 Model for "Torsion", a small 10 centimetres (3.9 in)-high Perspex model; his larger work Torsion from 1929–37, a 35 centimetres (14 in)-high model also in Perspex; and his 1960–64 Torsion (Project for a Fountain), an 80 centimetres (31 in)-high bronze maquette.

A commission was suggested by Sir Norman Reid, director of the Tate Gallery, when he saw the models on a visit to Gabo's studio in the United States in 1968. Gabo sent his maquette to London and the full-size sculpture was constructed of several stainless steel plates, creating a stack of intersecting curves, deliberately unadorned and without colour. The sculpture...