Public Art: Passacaglia

A large recycled cast iron art piece called passacaglia sits on the sand on the beach
  • Title of artwork: Passacaglia
  • Materials: Recycled cast iron
  • Location: Brighton Beach (opposite Middle Street)
  • Artist: Charles Hadcock
  • Date: 1998
  • Online map: Passacaglia Google map 
  • Information and map download: Passacaglia [PDF 238kb]

Passacaglia is a huge, curved abstract sculpture by Charles Hadcock; it is constructed from recycled cast iron, weighs 20 tonnes and is five meters high.  The sculpture is made from tiles pieced together, inspired by limestone terraces. The tiles have textured surfaces that resemble Yorkshire paving, some are curved and some are flat which gives the sculpture the shape of a giant wave crashing on the beach. The reverse side of each tile reveals the nuts and bolts of the sculpture which was constructed by Hadcock on location in 1998.

Passacaglia was dismantled for repair in 2004 due to a crack appearing in the base line and was reinstalled in 2007 without the cracked tile.

Charles Hadcock is a sculptor, influenced by nature and mathematics. As with Passacaglia many of his works are large in scale and produced using traditional industrial process. He calculates how a sculpture can be separated into identical shapes and then creates patterns from these same shapes. He works creatively with multiples and numbers, such as Fibonacci numbers and the Golden Section which is a ratio defined by the number Phi which is meant to be proportionally pleasing to the eye. For more information visit Charles Hadcock's website.

 

See the next artwork: Twins