• sculptures & installations
  • drawings & paintings
  • Projects
    • AI UNIVERSE 2425
    • AI UNIVERSE (2023)
    • Plovdiv City Portrait (2022)
    • Buiten Beeld Knokke (2021)
    • Fremdkörper (2021)
    • Laser Drawings (2021)
    • Ciudad de Contenedores (2020)
    • Tehran (2020)
    • Shanghai Towers (2019)
    • The Wall of Sound (2023)
    • The Enterprise (2017 - ongoing)
    • Freight (2015)
    • Turbocharged (2010 - 2012)
    • Showroom
    • Painting on aluminium
    • All your base...
    • Vertere - vinyl label design
  • About
studiovanparys
  • sculptures & installations
  • drawings & paintings
  • Projects
    • AI UNIVERSE 2425
    • AI UNIVERSE (2023)
    • Plovdiv City Portrait (2022)
    • Buiten Beeld Knokke (2021)
    • Fremdkörper (2021)
    • Laser Drawings (2021)
    • Ciudad de Contenedores (2020)
    • Tehran (2020)
    • Shanghai Towers (2019)
    • The Wall of Sound (2023)
    • The Enterprise (2017 - ongoing)
    • Freight (2015)
    • Turbocharged (2010 - 2012)
    • Showroom
    • Painting on aluminium
    • All your base...
    • Vertere - vinyl label design
  • About

Freight

Freight introduces a fully realized, immersive world. Its distended creations groan under the burden of counterpoised impressions, simultaneously autonomous while forming a heaving mass of sensory information. Produced between 2013 and 2014, forty-five shipping-crane inspired sculptures assert their dominance over the installation’s three hundred and thirty two bespoke containers, sitting beside or atop numerous marble-coloured pillars.

These analogue works, though grounded in the technology of Belgium’s harbour ports (particularly straddle carriers, or Olifantje), become more abstract entities. The end result is an uncanny landscape; a twisted container terminal in space. Navigating through this apparently static world, the viewer confronts an oscillation of qualities: functionality fusing with ostentation, suggesting a precarious balance; the benign activity of machines flickering with latent alien danger. Freight’s power lies in this embodied spirit of indeterminacy.

partial studio setup of Freight. Picture by Kobe Wens

Sculptures

Total installation

Total installation

Blocked

Blocked

Containers, small sub-series

Containers, small sub-series

Wide range

Wide range

Elephant

Elephant

Pick & Go

Pick & Go

Pillars

Pillars

Sorting Out

Sorting Out

Tripod

Tripod

Twist & Lock

Twist & Lock

I use drafts, short cuts, and flashbacks to tame the production process for my sculptures. It's important for me to have an overview while creating. When I develop my artworks, I consider each sculpture autonomous. They should be able to stand out on their own, but also function as part of a group.

Developing my Freight series was like walking a tightrope. I had to create the right tension between the volumes, machines, containers and pedestals in order to achieve a great balance. SoI pay attention to the tensions between different forms, and use them to create harmony and visual interest.

preliminary drawings

An early design for Tackle (1)

An early design for Tackle (1)

An early design for Twist & Lock

An early design for Twist & Lock

Containercity 1

Containercity 1

Containercity 2

Containercity 2

Containercity 3

Containercity 3

Containercity 4

Containercity 4

An early design for Wide Range (2)

An early design for Wide Range (2)

Design for an order picker

Design for an order picker

Design for a tackling device

Design for a tackling device

Design for a truck

Design for a truck

Designing Blocked

Designing Blocked

A possible presentation of Freight

A possible presentation of Freight

The drawing process of Elephant

The drawing process of Elephant

Designing Pick & Go

Designing Pick & Go

Designing Tackle

Designing Tackle

An early design for Blocked

An early design for Blocked

Multiple designs for a Cargo train

Multiple designs for a Cargo train

Multiple designs for an unloading crane

Multiple designs for an unloading crane

Multiple designs for a long Tackle

Multiple designs for a long Tackle

The beast

The beast

Designing Twist & Lock

Designing Twist & Lock

Multiple designs for Pillar

Multiple designs for Pillar

Designing forklift

Designing forklift

designing a Tripod

designing a Tripod

Multiple designs for a supporting structure

Multiple designs for a supporting structure

Multiple designs for Rogue

Multiple designs for Rogue

Two designs for a Clamp

Two designs for a Clamp

 
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© 2025 Simon Van Parys