Fired up playing with wire

VICTOR Tan is known for his beautiful and anatomically realistic wire-shaped human figures, but the sculptor has let his wires take on a life of their own in the last couple of years.

He'll be showing an uncharacteristically abstract collection of wire sculptures in his upcoming exhibition - a result of him playing with wire.

It all started a couple of years ago, when his studio was emptied out for a show at The Esplanade. "I started pulling out some wire and playing with it," says the 44-year-old artist, of the 0.5mm wire imported from Japan. He started balling up the wire, and was intrigued at how they sprang into other shapes as a reaction.

Demonstrating the bouncy round shapes forming outside his hands while he bunched up some wire, he recalls: "It struck me that what wasn't within my grasp seemed to be a form of life itself. They reflected the character of the material," he explains. Tan then decided to just play with t…