Picnic is a playful looping picnic table designed by artist Michael Beitz. The green dining surface is the latest in the artist's line of functional sculptures, offering a whimsical take on standard pieces of furniture. The sculptor's collection of works, which are inspired by the “social, personal, and material functions of furniture,” present conventional furnishings in an extremely unconventional way.
Rather than simply seating oneself at a flat, mundane table, Beitz's Picnic offers people a bench to sit on and have a fun conversation about life. Like his past work, this piece explores human relationships, both with each other and with inanimate objects. By changing the shape of the table (elongating and twisting it around itself), people are forced to seat themselves accordingly, thereby affecting how we interact with one another.
Picnic is currently on display on the roof of the Madison Museum of Contemporary Art in Wisconsin as part of the 2013 Triennial.
