(The
Kurt Wenner work at Gateway featuring
Red Cap Radio personality David Yapp and his
daughter)
The 3D effect is so dramatic one
instinctively wants to duck to avoid the car! (Review by Keith Millar)
Kurt Wenner, internationally renowned as
the creator of 3D pavement art, visited the Gateway Theatre of Shopping in
Umhlanga last week to assist the Hyundai Motor Company to launch their
innovative new model, the Veloster, in KZN.
In his giant 3D illustration to celebrate
this event Wenner depicts the Veloster zooming spectacularly down a roller
coaster. The 3D effect is quite dramatic and one instinctively wants to duck to
avoid the car.
Wenner received his first commission to
produce an art work at the age of 16. He attended design school and art college
after which he worked for NASA as an advanced scientific illustrator.
A move to Rome to study classical art saw
Wenner getting involved in pavement art. Climbing scaffolding to examine
baroque frescoes in churches across Italy, he noticed that artists had used
anamorphic perspective and had elongated the figures to make their works look
normal when viewed from the ground.
Wenner wanted to develop on this and
accommodate the viewpoints of spectators standing at the base of his works.
This led to him inventing a new geometry which uses a logical linear
perspective with a projection outwards from the human eye. Known as Wenner’s
hyperbolic perspective, it is used to create the extraordinary three-dimensional
illusions for which he is so famous.
Wenner believes that his artworks should be
accessible to the public and as a result they were able to pose for photographs
while standing on the mural. The result is a photograph perfectly in
perspective.
Also on display at Gateway was the
beautiful new Hyundai Veloster. It is a sleek and distinctively designed coupé
which features a unique three door design.
Hyundai General Manager Corporate
Communications, Deon Sonnekus, explained the symbiotic relationship between art
and technology in the world of car design. While there is a constant need for
creativity and innovation in design there is always certain mathematical and
scientific limitations which need to be considered. He said that Hyundai is
showing an new original approach to car design just as Kurt Wenner had explored
new frontiers in art discipline. – Keith Millar
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