An original tape artwork by Max Zorn

Let them have the rest, we own the night baby

An illuminated city in three panels · 2019

Let them have the rest… by Max Zorn, with an embracing couple above crowded streets, vintage traffic and illuminated theatre signs. — The complete composition. Packing tape on acrylic glass, 300 × 140 cm.View full size

An embracing couple overlooks a city crowded with people, streetcars and vintage automobiles. Her head rests against his shoulder; her hand reaches around his waist. Beyond them, the whole night is still unfolding.

Artist: Max Zorn
Year: 2019
Medium: Hand-cut and layered packing tape on acrylic glass
Size: 300 × 140 cm (width × height)
Format: Triptych in three illuminated frames

Inside the picture

A private moment above the city

The composition gives a small gesture the scale of a three-metre cityscape. Theatre signs and bright windows carry the eye along the avenues: a crowd outside a theatre, a car among the traffic, an ocean liner on a poster. Parts of the title appear on the buildings themselves. The city keeps pulling us further in; the embrace keeps drawing us back.

Max describes the setting as loosely inspired by Times Square decades ago. Buildings, signs and remembered impressions meet invented elements in a city assembled for this scene. Its vintage streets and deep perspective recall the expansive sets of cinema.

The embracing couple in Max Zorn’s Let them have the rest…, their arms and clothing formed from layers of illuminated packing tape. — The embrace in the left-hand panel. Layers of tape shape the hands, hair and folds of clothing.

Detail of Max Zorn’s Let them have the rest… showing a theatre marquee, dense crowds, streetcars and reflected light. — The city beyond: crowds and streetcars beneath a marquee reading *Pockets full of freedom*.

Explore four more details of the finished artwork

The central avenue in Max Zorn’s Let them have the rest…, with crowds, vintage cars, theatre signs and an ocean-liner poster. — An avenue of crowds, vintage cars and theatre signs extends into the distance.

Illuminated architecture, crowds and an ocean-liner poster in a wide detail of Max Zorn’s Let them have the rest… — Crowds and illuminated architecture gather around the ocean-liner poster within the city scene.

Vintage cars, pedestrians in hats and a red streetcar in a close detail of Max Zorn’s tape artwork Let them have the rest… — Cars, pedestrians and a red streetcar share the reflected light of the city street.

Crowds beneath a theatre marquee reading Pockets full of freedom in Max Zorn’s tape artwork Let them have the rest… — Pockets full of freedom: the theatre marquee above a dense crowd in the finished artwork.

The physical making

A city built by hand

Every face, window and reflection is cut and layered from packing tape on acrylic glass. Brown tape builds much of the tonal range, with red, green, yellow and white extending its colour. Dense overlaps hold back more light; thinner passages let the streets and signs shine through.

Max Zorn reaches up across Let them have the rest…, a large illuminated tape-art cityscape with an embracing couple. — Max working across the illuminated composition. Seen from the working side, the city and its lettering appear in reverse.

Max Zorn cuts fine details into the layered tape of Let them have the rest… with a precision knife. — Cutting the city’s small figures and architectural details with a precision knife.

Max Zorn holds a cut strip of packing tape against the illuminated buildings of Let them have the rest… — Lifting a cut strip away from the layered tape.

See another making stage and a close view of the layering

Max Zorn working on Let them have the rest…, with the couple already formed and large areas of the backlit city still unfinished. — Let them have the rest… in progress, with the couple established and much of the city still taking shape.

Max Zorn works with packing tape and a precision knife above the ship poster in Let them have the rest… — Layering and cutting the illuminated architecture around the ocean-liner poster.

The original making film

More than two months, in minutes

The time-lapse follows the composition as it develops across the panels, condensing more than two months of work into a few minutes.

Watch the making film on YouTube

The artwork in light

Three frames, one continuous scene

In the finished triptych, three black frames provide warm LED illumination from behind. The light reveals the different densities of tape, from the pale surface of a street to a densely layered coat. The city continues across the three panels.

Let them have the rest… by Max Zorn, an illuminated tape-art triptych in black frames with a couple above a crowded theatre district. — *Let them have the rest…* displayed in three illuminated black frames.

At three metres wide, this is a substantial physical artwork. The framed view shows its presence on a wall; the close view reveals the depth of one frame.

Explore illuminated frames and care, or see Max’s art in interiors.

An angled close view of a black frame around Let them have the rest…, with the illuminated tape image softly visible beyond its edge. — A close view of the black frame and illuminated image.

Collecting Max Zorn

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This composition was introduced on the website in November 2019, alongside Max’s Miami collection. Its original release belongs to the 2019 studio archive.