Tree I

The history of the National Institutes of Health and the mission of the Lister Hill National Center for Biomedical Communications inspired artist Kenneth Snelson to create this elegantly angular metal sculpture.  Snelson has described his artistic practice as being “concerned with nature in its primary aspect, the patterns of physical forces in three-dimensional space.”

The sculpture’s complex composition reflects Snelson’s interests in atomic theory, the underlying structures of the universe, and the idea of connectedness.  As indicated by the artwork’s title, Tree I also suggests an abstract tree of knowledge, its many branches symbolizing the interrelatedness of science and the humanities. 

The artwork’s modular configurations of rods and wires distribute a scheme of compression and tension, or push and pull.  Snelson’s interplay of elements in his sculptural works embodies what he calls “tensegrity.”  A contraction of the terms tension and integrity, tensegrity describes the forces between the rods and wires that holds the sculpture in dynamic equilibrium.