October 3 - October 30, 2002

Juan Geuer | the truth about cartesian clarity | review

The Loom Drum

The Loom Drum (detail)

Rock Heist & The Loom Drum (installation view)

Juan Geuer was born in Soest, Holland on April 17, 1917. His father and mother were both artists. From 1934 to 1937,he worked occasionally with architect Piet Klaarhamer in Utrecht, Holland. Through Klaarhamer, Geuer met various members associated with the influential De Stijl movement. In 1939 he and his family moved to Bolivia and lived in an artists' colony in the Yungas jungle, where Geuer experimented with local minerals to create stained glass, sometimes in an abstract expressionist style. In 1947 Geuer moved to La Paz, where he worked as a textile expert and became involved in the ideological and philosophical deliberations of Bolivia's capital at that time. Seven years later he emigrated to Canada and was subsequently hired by the Dominion Observatory in Ottawa, where he remained employed until 1979 as a draftsman and designer of fine instruments and scientific exhibitions. He also participated in some of the Observatory's geophysical investigations. From 1962 to 1973, Geuer painted expressionist works which were exhibited in Canada and in the United States. He gradually became more involved in the Ottawa art community, and began teaching at the Municipal Art Centre in Ottawa in 1968 and at the Art History Department, Carleton University in 1970. In 1973, he founded "The Truth Seeker Company" as a focus for the new direction in his work. The company's stated purpose is "to study our perception beyond science and art and to investigate our creative ability for adapting new visions."
Juan Geuer currently lives in Almonte, Ontario.

The Loom Drum
depicts the 5,500 earthquakes
measuring 4.0 or more on the Richter scale which
were recorded in North America from January
1960 to January 1989. The time scale is contracted
so that one day lasts only one-twelfth of a
second, and the thirty-year span is condensed to
a fifteen-minute cycle. Flashing lights, each
representing one earthquake, appear on the blank
surface of a concave, circular screen.
Viewed from this side, the lights form an abstract,
rhythmic pattern in space and time. On the other side
of the screen, however, the same light flashes are
superimposed on a map of North America; here,
the light flashes (earthquakes) are referenced to
their precise location in space and time.

The Truth About Cartesian Clarity
Intersecting lines are carefully and precisely etched into opaque coating without gouging the mylar underneath. The transparent lines appear to be uniformly straight and smooth, but a close inspection of the intersection points reveals a tangle of minute twists and irregularities. Jean-Francois Renaud