Mushroom Cloud Playhouse

Dietrich Wegner, Playhouse, 2006-08, Poly-fil, rope, wood and steel

Sculpturist Dietrich Wegner created the Playhouse sculpture, “a twenty-foot-tall tree house posing as an atomic mushroom cloud” to show contradictions between “two conflicting ideas”. It was on display at the Weston Art Gallery in Cincinnati.

When an image stands in limbo, between associations, it occupies a flexible place in our mind. Wegner creates images that are safe and unsettling, abject and beautiful…The ephemeral beauty of a mushroom cloud is frightening, how it floats for a minute, delicate and blooming, yet remains chaotic and utterly destructive. We experience a contradiction between what our eyes enjoy and what our mind knows.

image via Weston Art Gallery