Installation | It is a small sphere and a heavy sphere by Andrew Maize

August 1 - 3, 2025

Ongoing throughout the festival at the Memorial Park Gazebo and perhaps elsewhere

Presented as part of L'Ambiance

as part of Struts' partnership with Sappyfest

What have we here? it is a small sphere and a heavy sphere (SSHS) is an homage to Alexander Calder’s seminal mobile, Small Sphere and Heavy Sphere (1932/33), which consisted of a heavy lead ball, a small wooden ball and 7 found objects which he called impedimenta (a wooden crate, a symbol, 4 glass bottles, a tin can.) 
 By pushing the heavy sphere, the small sphere is sent flying through a series of engagements and avoidances with the impedimenta, playing with expectations as we try to anticipate its complex and unpredictable interactions. It’s not Rube Goldberg, nor is it Fischli and Weiss. It is the way things go. 

It is a small sphere and a heavy sphere will be shifting its form and location throughout Sappyfest. Come and give it a try.

About the Artist

Andrew Maize makes art that is often playful, collaborative and improvised, its form is contingent on the relationships of environmental, technological, social, and material situations.  As an educator and organizer, he has been involved in collaborative projects that engage communities with art, both in traditional and non-traditional spaces. He has been meaning to make a list of all the different jobs he had over the years, but it would be a lot of work. He has taught and hopes to teach again in Expanded Media and Fine Arts at NSCAD University.