''The Way Things Go'' () is a 1987

16 mm 16 mm film is a historically popular and economical Film gauge, gauge of Photographic film, film. 16 mm refers to the width of the film (about inch); other common film gauges include 8 mm film, 8 mm and 35mm movie film, 35 mm. It ...

art film An art film, arthouse film, or specialty film is an independent film aimed at a niche market rather than a mass market audience. It is "intended to be a serious, artistic work, often experimental and not designed for mass appeal", "made prima ...

by the

Swiss Swiss most commonly refers to: * the adjectival form of Switzerland * Swiss people Swiss may also refer to: Places * Swiss, Missouri * Swiss, North Carolina * Swiss, West Virginia * Swiss, Wisconsin Other uses * Swiss Café, an old café located ...

artist duo Peter Fischli and David Weiss. It documents a long causal chain assembled of everyday objects and industrial materials in the manner of a

Rube Goldberg machine A Rube Goldberg machine, named after American cartoonist Rube Goldberg, is a chain reaction–type machine or contraption intentionally designed to perform a simple task in a comically overcomplicated way. Usually, these machines consist of a s ...

, though without the

trope Trope or tropes may refer to: Arts and entertainment * Trope (cinema), a cinematic convention for conveying a concept * Trope (literature), a figure of speech or common literary device * Trope (music), any of a variety of different things in medi ...

of accomplishing a relatively mundane task at the end.

Description

The installation was in the artists'

Zürich Zurich (; ) is the list of cities in Switzerland, largest city in Switzerland and the capital of the canton of Zurich. It is in north-central Switzerland, at the northwestern tip of Lake Zurich. , the municipality had 448,664 inhabitants. The ...

warehouse studio, about 100 feet long, and incorporated materials such as tires, trash bags, ladders, soap, oil drums, old shoes, water, and gasoline. Fire and pyrotechnics were used as chemical triggers. The film is 29 minutes and 45 seconds long, but some of that is spent waiting for something to burn, dissolve, or slowly slide down a ramp. Long processes with little visible change are skipped with a fade out/fade in. The film is presented as a single sequence of events, but careful observation reveals over two dozen film edits.

Production

The film evolved out of work the artists did on their earlier photography series, ''Quiet Afternoon'', () of 1984-1985. As the delicately unstable assemblages they constructed for the photos were apt to almost immediately collapse, they decided that they wanted to make use of this energy. The film may also have been inspired by the video work of fellow Swiss artist

Roman Signer Roman Signer (born 1938 in Appenzell, Switzerland) is an artist who works in sculpture, art installation, photography, and video. Early life and career Signer started his career as an artist at the age of 28, after working various jobs such as an ...

. The artists likely saw his video work which was exhibited at the

Kunsthaus Zürich The Kunsthaus Zürich is an art museum in Zurich. It is the biggest art museum in Switzerland by area and houses one of the most important art collections in Switzerland, assembled over time by the Zürcher Kunstgesellschaft, a nonprofit art soc ...

in 1981. Signer's videos often document objects performing simple actions that are the result of physical phenomena.

Copyright dispute with Honda

In May 2003, Fischli and Weiss threatened legal action against

Honda commonly known as just Honda, is a Japanese multinational corporation, multinational Conglomerate (company), conglomerate automotive manufacturer headquartered in Minato, Tokyo, Japan. Founded in October 1946 by Soichiro Honda, Honda has bee ...

over similarities between the ''Cog'' commercial and ''The Way Things Go''. The artists felt that the ad's creators had "obviously seen" their film and should have consulted them. Fischli and Weiss had refused several requests to use the film for commercial purposes, though Honda claimed that this was irrelevant as their permission was not needed to create new works with some elements similar to their previous works. Honda's advertising firm

Wieden+Kennedy Wieden+Kennedy (W+K; earlier styled ''Wieden & Kennedy'') is an American advertising agency best known for its work for Nike. Founded by Dan Wieden and David Kennedy, and headquartered in Portland, Oregon, it is one of the largest independent ...

eventually admitted to copying a sequence of weighted tires rolling uphill. The controversy was blamed for denying ''Cog'' a Grand Prix at the 2004

Cannes Lions International Advertising Festival The Cannes Lions International Festival of Creativity (formerly the International Advertising Festival) is a global event for those working in creative communications, advertising, and related fields. It is considered the largest gathering of the ...

Exhibitions

The movie was a public highlight of the '' documenta 8'' exhibition in Kassel, Germany (June - September 1987), and is on permanent exhibition in the

Museum of Modern Art The Museum of Modern Art (MoMA) is an art museum located in Midtown Manhattan, New York City, on 53rd Street (Manhattan), 53rd Street between Fifth Avenue, Fifth and Sixth Avenues. MoMA's collection spans the late 19th century to the present, a ...

in New York City, and in the

Museum Wiesbaden The Museum Wiesbaden is a two-branch museum of Art museum, art and Natural history museum, natural history in the Hesse, Hessian capital of Wiesbaden, Germany. It is one of the three Hessian State museums, in addition to the museums in Hessian ...

in Wiesbaden. It is also part of

Centre Georges Pompidou The Centre Pompidou (), more fully the (), also known as the Pompidou Centre in English and colloquially as Beaubourg, is a building complex in Paris, France. It was designed in the style of high-tech architecture by the architectural team of ...

's collection in Paris. , the film was on display in the Gallery of Modern Art in Glasgow, Scotland; the ''Sir Isaac's Loft'' section of the

Franklin Institute The Franklin Institute is a science museum and a center of science education and research in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. It is named after the American scientist and wikt:statesman, statesman Benjamin Franklin. It houses the Benjamin Franklin ...

in Philadelphia; the

Louisiana Museum of Modern Art The Louisiana Museum of Modern Art, also known as the Louisiana, is an art museum located north of Copenhagen, Denmark. Attracting over 700,000 guests annually, the Louisiana is Scandinavia's most visited museum for Modern art, modern and contempor ...

in Copenhagen, Denmark; and it was shown on rotation with other short art films at

British Columbia British Columbia is the westernmost Provinces and territories of Canada, province of Canada. Situated in the Pacific Northwest between the Pacific Ocean and the Rocky Mountains, the province has a diverse geography, with rugged landscapes that ...

's Robson Square Celebration Site outside the

Vancouver Art Gallery The Vancouver Art Gallery (VAG) is an art museum in Vancouver, British Columbia, Canada. The museum occupies a adjacent to Robson Square in downtown Vancouver, making it the largest art museum in Western Canada by building size. Designed by Fr ...

during the Vancouver 2010 Winter Olympics and Paralympics. Until January 2009 it was also shown at the

Western Australian Museum The Western Australian Museum is a statutory body, statutory authority within the Culture and the Arts Portfolio, established under the ''Museum Act 1969''. The museum has six main sites. The state museum, WA Museum Boola Bardip, is located i ...

in Perth, Western Australia as part of the temporary exhibition ''Experimenta Playground''. , the film was also shown at the MALBA in Buenos Aires, Argentina, at the MACM in Montréal, Quebec, Canada; at the Mead Gallery of the Warwick Arts Centre in Coventry, UK; and at the Institut Valencià d'Art Modern (IVAM) in Valencia, Spain. , the film was shown at The Margulies Collection at the Warehouse in Miami, Florida, and the Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum in New York City. Between June 2016 and August 2017, the film was shown as part o
Masterworks from the Hirshhorn Collection
at the

Hirshhorn Museum and Sculpture Garden The Hirshhorn Museum and Sculpture Garden is an art museum beside the National Mall in Washington, D.C., United States. The museum was initially endowed during the 1960s with the permanent art collection of Joseph H. Hirshhorn. It was designed ...

in Washington, DC. The Joan Miró Foundation in Barcelona organised a temporary exhibit under the name ''The way things do'' during summer 2017, to commemorate the 30th anniversary of the film. Between December 2017 and April 2018, the film was shown at the exhibition ''Gravity: Imaging the universe after Einstein'' at the MAXXI museum in Rome, Italy. Between October 2021 and March 2022, the film was shown as part of the exhibition '' Beano: The Art of Breaking the Rules'' at

Somerset House Somerset House is a large neoclassical architecture, neoclassical building complex situated on the south side of the Strand, London, Strand in central London, overlooking the River Thames, just east of Waterloo Bridge. The Georgian era quadran ...

London London is the Capital city, capital and List of urban areas in the United Kingdom, largest city of both England and the United Kingdom, with a population of in . London metropolitan area, Its wider metropolitan area is the largest in Wester ...

, a retrospective look at the British children's comic and its influence in the wider world. The film is also available on DVD.

References

External links