[[[That the object is sculpture….

That all objects are things….

Sculpture is really about the conversation ; because its reflective condition bounds to and from the subject to the object. And yet,

The thing and idea happen at the same time by ‘the definition of Identity’.

And this, even as ‘the same time’ can be long or short.]]]

REAL POLITIK . forged iron . 35 lbs . 11″ . 1992 – 2024.

Where ‘a thing is the meaning of an idea’ we can reflect, commute , and or locate space and mass .

”Aristotle’s’ SYLLOGISM is transitive’, as demonstrated by Wilfrid von Leibniz (1676).

“A thing is the meaning of an idea.” George Boole (1815-1864).

“Mass cannot exist without space,” Albert Einstein.

“The Medium is the Message,” Marshal McLuan equals Boole. (aka medium or thing is message or idea)

“A thing is itself,” Euclid equates a thing and a self : ‘the mind, body duality’.

The Syllogism is a three dimensional relation of terms that intuitively relate in propositions but ; also practically as sculpture shows in the “metaCUBE” . Like: “If all men are mortal, and Socrates is a man, then Socrates is mortal:” is “transitive”, A=B=C and is a Syllogism .

Sculpture is the Art of the Thing. Its Ideas are subject to the objects.

   Hot from the forge, an object is worked towards some idea that could make it a thing. Perhaps it is squaring-the-round that Jacob Lischer has tasked you to the length of a bar. Then POINT(s) : he has instructed you how to ‘draw’ the thickness down over the edge of the anvil … then snipping your attempt between hammer and hardy. And another and another. Matter and space are the limits. And you try to perfect the ‘point’. People are watching. You are the ‘apprentist in exhibit’ at expo 67.

   And then you read some Euclid. “A POINT is that which hath no parts.” 

Which is clearly suggested here as the place where the mass drops to zero .

And then,”A LINE is the distance between two points.” Euclid. But what is the question?

                                               

Let a three-dimensional vertex be the POINT where three LINES meet.

And then too quickly perhaps … a two-dimensional intersection , is a coordinate , is a POINT , is where two LINES meet but; the interest is not only in the experience of distances but also; how ‘the equality’ of identity is manifest’.

(L)

EUCLIDEAN space says “A POINT is that which hath no PARTS.”

LET Euclid’s point be ZERO (O).

One-dimension is that which is defined where:”A LINE is the distance between two POINTS”.

We want our sculpture to ‘speak of itself’, so articulate the ends-at-a-distance. The ‘ends’ , the “points” are ZERO(s)-at-a-distance!

0=0

Lets go with the PARTS

In ‘one-dimension : let a line be ONE distance between TWO ends. Also known as the REFLECTIVE : A is A . Or Boole’s IDENTITY  that is:(0=0)

AND in ‘three-dimensions’ , a POINT somewhere “contained” in the Transitive is at the vertex of a three-dimensional logical configuration or where A = B = C ; but here represented in a drawing….

BUT, the ends beg completion towards symmetry: they ask questions . Eventually a ‘thing’ of TWO ends answers itself in the meta-CUBE. The ‘logic’ of the thing and the idea reflect here.

THE SYLLOGISM is what Leibniz demonstrates to be transitive. Our intuition become a thing! Sculpture demonstrates TRANSITIVITY and completes the question.   SO, the SYLLOGISM is metaCUBIC .

2:00am … function in dimension . 

Here the reflective TERMs (A is A or B is B or C is C) are three identities realized as three distinct LINES. Where each line is one-dimension, it has the integrity of a boundary then; separately we have three dimensions in-a-row! 0=0 , 0=0 , 0=0 .

In the second degree, carefully integrating, towards a PROPOSITION equates identities [(A=A)= (B=B)] or (A is B) and (B is A). This is known as “commutation”: that is AB = BA . Here the Identities are in synthetic relation : that is “contained”: that is equal. This is interesting as it is definitive . We now have two-dimensions “meeting”: as equal as they are co-ordinated. TWO TWOS !

AB = BA . steel . 1975 .

But TWO SQUARED is FOUR or 2 times 2 = four . And we have a ‘square’!

The meaning of TWO Squared is “four” even as the articulated co-ordinates are identified by overlap. Does not the overlap say 0 = 1 and conversely 1 = 0 ?

(And in that conversation , one incurs : the ‘flat’ , symbol does not differentiate mass and space! Do we continue unabated: talking only about one end’? Does the medium affect meaning?)

In the medium of SCULPTURE “mass and space” are penultimate. One cannot exist without the other. Both ‘speak’ to the other as figure is to ground. The relation of truth is a simple binary .

Even as “a thing is itself”: the idea ‘the thing’ propels is the proximity of identities and that is differentiation at superficies, and that is up to and within’ the limit of boundary: where “superficies” is the interrior.

Towards three-dimensions…

If this is the occasion of conversation: the relations of “term” , “proposition” , and “syllogism” : ought to suggest a case of transference that cannot leap boundaries even as “equality” maintains an equality of equals : itself, the other and three (or more).

An algebra of A = B = C would look like what? (0=0)x(0=0)x(0=0) ?

The AXIOM that Leibniz in Metaphysics is investing in towards the logic and mechanics of the “steel thinking machine” begins with his demonstration of Aristotle’s ‘syllogism’ .

Leibniz Metaphysics . facsimile on an Amiga . 1995 .

Have we demystified “…those elements of perception which are encountered without material or objective reference available to the eyes” ? *Plato

Question: Can one reciprocate the manifest “axiom of transitivity” to realize “its” idea ?

Just as this argument explains mtaphysical form and physical reality , its intention in Leibniz is fleshed out in his question: “Why is there not nothing?” Then we are affirming opposites: like the ‘structure of duality’, ‘something equals nothing’.

And this much as the ‘key-hole’ is demonstrated in this flipped gestalt .The flipping occurs where again 0=1 . If it is something it is mass. If it is nothing, space.

“A thing is the meaning of an idea.” is symbolized by Boole and the symbol is 0=0 ; which is tautologic as A is A. In algebra, Boole says we only need use one side of this. And let me add this is a’western conceit invented in Egypt by the ankh: a separation of the ruled and the ruler is a Dyslectic: mind and body.

BUT: the integrity of sculpture is the ‘thing’ with physical structure that exemplifies in that medium what is the duality reflected in the message: in the ‘idea’.

(Yes, I sent a photo to Buckminster Fuller)

Let us assign the tautologies….A is A , or B is B or C is C etc.

1st

“A LINE has two ends.”

HEAD TWO (Rivington School) . steel . forged . 5″ . 1986

(Yes, Serra said he “liked” this.)

And something else about the concept of ‘TWO’…. The DIJECT is how we get the computer program to morph from cube to two and or two to a cube.
Euler’s Formula’ : 8 vertices + 6 sides – 12 lines = 2.

SO, what is meant here is the definition of a CUBE : can be a function or derivative of TWO . This makes the dimensional message and the mediums of ‘TWO’ one-dimensional artifacts that accesses : Time has ‘two ends’ in one-dimension and is a vertex in three.

As ancient as time, the PALEOLITHIC NUT CRACKER begins its journey between the thumb and the middle finger – which accounts for the TWO dimples on top and bottom of each stone – the other stone being the anvil .

PALEOLITHIC NUT CRACKER . stone . 2018
Here completing an action where cracking the nut takes the flow of the metaCUBE – we have eight vertex equated in a structure..

Where REALPOLITIK is a reflection of the small mind and the big thing, esthetics as it equates to ethics, gets understood.

Then the truism which says A is A .

That we are calling a thing an idea: its presence real and its idea imaginary is proof that ideas are things.

Again, this ‘thing’ has two ends, is binary, just as space is exactly not mass.

CRACK HEAD . forged steel . 1994

The work is a combination of space and mass where the binary gestalts have been introduced by the physics of geometry and the meta of logic .

BASIC SHAPES

Art brings consciousness: the domains of figure/ ground, space/self and mass/self.

2:30 am

The meta-line , square , and cube are logically ‘perfect’ ideas; but as things , they are an ‘approach’. The intriguing difference between reality and the imagination is not lost in sculpture.

(I posted a zerox of this about town)

ONE , zero . graffiti on the mobile . 2003

All this asserts is that mass, space, and self are the elements of sculpture that , in a string of events reflect the idea to the thing .

BLOCK HEAD . ‘the idea’ . wood . 2021

REFLECTION No. 1 . wood , graphite . 2010

(there is a steel CUBE between the two)

TALISMAN . bifurcate . forged steel . 15″. 2025

(How does one line splits to two?” Joe Flack, the farmer from Walkerton, Ontario brought me to a blacksmith!) 1970 . I became an apprentice performing at the side of EXPO 67 , Montreal. With a five year plan, I opened my own shop in Salem, Ontario . I attended the FREE SCHOOL in Toronto. I received an Ontario Art Council Grant through the ___ Gallery. Then in 1979, I bought my shop to NYC .

GREEN MACHINE . Space and mass in equal measure . Crossing Gallery . Kingston . NY . 2025

I-BEAM (zero = zero)

Mad Machine . CANO , Oneonta . wood , pigment 2025

Red and Blue Ladies . Epicurious , Franklin , NY . wood ash, cherry . 2025 (still up in 2026)

Eyeballs or wat ? forged steel ___lbs . 1990-2000

Split in Red . wood , pigment . 20__ CANO , Oneonta , NY

• Leonid Sokov stole one of my HEADS , put his Lenin bust in it . Now it is in a Moscow Museum .

Bazura , M . Walton Library – ‘small painting show’ acrylic . 2024

CRAIN . Headwaters Art Space . steel . 1995 – 2025 .

Hack License Vox Popoli Gallery . steel , electricity , pigment. 1985 .

A Thing is Itself (solo) Livingston Manor . NY . 2015(?)

FORGING SPIKES . peformance . stigmata show (curated by Kaplan) 1986

Dummkoph . Tovy Hallock and RobertParker , Rivington School , NYC . 1984

metaCUBE , steel , 3′ nominal , 2024 .
(this ‘of course’ collapses ‘flat’ to the ground; but in a ‘flat’ photograph pops up into the third-dimension!)

AND … Euler’s Formula (for the diject): 8 verticies + 6 faces – 12 Lines = 2

Here , we appropriate Plato : “…those elements of perception which are encountered without material or objective reference available to the eyes.”

Question: Does the physical representation of the axiom of transitivity realize the idea in itself ?

Question: Is the Newton’s “tangent” a synthesis? How are ‘identities’ related?

CANDELABRA for the ROSCO BIN gallery . 2026

Robert Parker 2026