Diller Scofidio & Renfro, A plan for the Hirshhorn calls for an inflatable structure that pokes through the building's top and side, on the National Mall. via NYT
While I’m quite fond of the Hirshhorn building, there is a great line in Nicolai Ourossoff’s NYT article, writing that Diller Scofidio & Renfro‘s addition “would transform one of the most somber buildings on the mall into a luminous pop landmark.”
Apparently,
“The architects imagine the installation process as a performance piece in itself, something like watching event organizers blow up the balloons for the Macy’s Thanksgiving Day Parade. Two refrigerator-size air pumps would be used to inflate the baby-blue structure, which would fill the entire four-story courtyard and bulge out of the top. A smaller, globulelike form would swell out of the bottom of the building to create a public lounge overlooking the mall.”
Now that I can no longer legitimately take my son to the nearby merry go round, I would definitely substitute the Hirshhorn inflation on the itinerary.
“created by Asymptote Architecture with lighting design by Arup, The Yas Hotel is a wrapped with a sparkling shell composed of more than 5,300 diamond-shaped panels bristling with over 5,000 LED fixtures. The curvilinear field of lights is capable of running color-changing light sequences and can even display low-res three-dimensional videos.”
So far the images of the Yas Hotel seem like a pretty small official set. Here are some others from a quick scan of flickr.
Tokujin Yoshioka has designed a window installation for Maison Hermès. Maison Hermès Window Display
duration: Nov 19, 2009 ~ Jan 19, 2010
location: Maison Hermès (ginza5-4-1, chuo-ku, tokyo)
‘air du temps 90x90' installation, silk scarves tirred by a light breeze maison hermès / forum in ginza, tokyo, 2004 photographer: nacasa & partners inc.
“As part of his “Second Nature†exhibition visitors were able to watch the crystalline chairs grow in large aquariums filled with a mineral solution. Although the shape of the fiber initially guides the crystals into chair-like objects, Yoshioka adds another dimension by allowing the chairs to choose their own form.” – via Inhabitat
Christophe Cornubert, The CO2 Cube in Copenhagen. Credit: Joshua Brott. via Culture Monster
“In Copenhagen, where the United Nations’ summit on global warming is currently underway, artists unveiled on Monday what they are calling ‘The CO2 Cube,’ a three-story site-specific artwork that was designed by L.A.-based architect Christophe Cornubert.” — David Ng via Culture Monster
CO2 CUBE, Saint Jørgen's Lake in front of Tycho Brahe Planetarium, Copenhagen Artistic concept by Alfio Bonanno Architecture by Christophe Cornubert, PUSH Digital imagery by Obscura Digital. Photo Joshusa Brott
C02 Cube. Image via Obscura Digital via Curbed LA.
“Is there anything shipping containers can’t do? Here they are arranged on a barge in St. Jørgens Lake in Copenhagen to visually represent one metric ton of carbon dioxide stored at standard atmospheric pressure. An average person in an industrialized country puts that amount out monthly.
“[Architect Chrisophe] Cornubert says the message of the shipping containers is deliberate–it calls to mind Copenhagen’s local shipping industry, consumption, and reuse all at once. Two sides of the big cube are covered in a mesh fabric and act as video screens, showing art, news, data visualizations, and other content. Besides all the transportation and construction, the CO2 Cube uses two 20,000 lumen projectors, an audio system, and LED lights.”
Rome is finally giving proper space to contemporary art. Not only between the walls of galleries and other traditional venues, but also in the streets, hosting new buildings (Zaha Hadid’s new MAXXI museum and Odile Decq’s expansion for Macro, to open in spring 2010), performances and open-air installations.
Doug Aitken’sFrontier is the latest evidence of this new deal: a spectacular video work installed on the Isola Tiberina, a natural island located in the very heart of the city, emerging from the river. After the end of the show, the work will be donated to Rome’s contemporary art museum (Macro), where it will be visible next year.
The press releases that accompanied the launch of the event, part of the third edition of Enel Contemporanea curated by Francesco Bonami, emphasized a supposed similarity between Aitken’s video room (which has numerous small windows and no roof) and the Colosseum. But the work doesn’t seem to look for any historical reference; it owes most of its appeal, on the contrary, to the visual clash it engages with the surroundings.
Visitors first see Frontier from above, standing on top of the bridge, then walk down the marble stairs and approach a white, luminous room. The video is projected all over the inner walls, and the light – with its intensity and colour variations – leaks out of the rectangular windows that punctuate the structure. The whole architecture becomes a screen and a framework for the story: a narrative – and somehow circular – journey about memory and time. At the beginning we see the american painter Ed Ruscha sitting in a darkened movie theatre. Then he leaves for an – imaginary? – walkabout through different locations and atmospheres (the video was shot in Rome, Los Angeles, Israel and South Africa). The camera alternates wide, quiet panoramas with intense close-ups of faces and objects; the overall feeling is mystical and romantic. Sometimes the artist just relies on colours, flooding the walls with vibrant textures of pure, liquid light. At last, the protagonist finds himself once again in the same setting – the cinema – where the video began.
In the end, it seems like the story, and even the video itself, doesn’t count as much as the whole, immersive experience. The experience of spending half an hour inside a big screen-bulding, on the tip of an old island (it resembles the tip of a vessel) with only the sky as a roof. The main role of the video is that of being an emotional trigger, gently pushing the spectator towards a dreamlike, contemplative mood.
Valentina Tanni
Valentina Tanni (www.valentinatanni.com) is a contemporary art critic and curator based in Rome, Italy. Her research is mainly focused on new media art and internet culture. She is the founder of Random Magazine (www.random-magazine.net) a digital art bulletin, and co-founder of Exibart.com (www.exibart.com), the most popular online art magazine in Italy.
‘Dots for Love and Peace’ was designed specifically for the City Gallery by Japanese artist Yayoi Kusama, who is renowned for her use of dots and repetitive patterns. The public artwork celebrates both her Mirrored Years exhibition and the re-opening of the City Art Gallery building. via StopPress.
Hometown manufacturer 3M supports new Yayoi KusamaDots for Love and Peace in Wellington, NZ.
“3M and SignSquad recently joined forces to cover the the City Art Gallery in Wellington in a whole lot of dots. The team worked 10-hours a day, six days a week for three weeks and had to warm every dot and roll it on to the sandstone surface by hand.
“‘3M has a history of producing innovative products,’ says Justin White, 3M sales specialist for commercial graphics. ‘When the City Gallery Wellington challenged us to apply that same level of innovation to the use of our products, we jumped at the chance.'”
“After visiting Chicago, and particularly Millenium Park, this past summer, I started thinking a lot about public art. I decided I have an opinion on the subject.”
West of Rome Public Art and Los Angeles artist Sam Durant propose Scaffold: A Direct Appeal (Working Title). via West of Rome Public Art.
“West of Rome Public Art and Los Angeles artist Sam Durant propose Scaffold: A Direct Appeal (Working Title), an interactive, sculptural installation promoting public forum, to take place in the Spring and Summer of 2011 in three different cities—Houston, New York City and Los Angeles. Scaffold continues the artist’s long-standing practice of incorporating socio-political issues into large-scale installations.
“Building from previous works like Upside Down: Pastoral Scene (2002), Proposal for White and Indian Dead Monuments Transposition, Washington D.C (2005), and Scenes from the Pilgrim Story (2006), this new project takes themes from American history into the public realm. An architecturally scaled construction that will serve as a platform for public programming, performance, reading and theater, Scaffold will engage the public on multiple levels, questioning received wisdom and historical truths.”
Paul Pfeiffer, "Cross Hall (2008)," Wall-recessed mixed media diorama, peephole, live video feed projection. Dimensions variable. Installation view courtesy of Carlier Gebauer. Photo by Bernd Borchardt. Collection of Sammlung Goetz, Munich.via Switchboard
“This panel will explore the multiple ways in which contemporary artists have utilized projection and installation strategies to display still photographic images, creating immersive and cinema-like experiences in museum and gallery environments.”
It’s still faintly amusing to me that a stellar panel like this might coalesce around the medium-specificity of the photographic image, deploying the term “immersive” in relation to cinema without, apparently, a nod to either the communicating projections of, say, Kit Galloway and Sherrie Rabinowitiz’s Hole-in-Space or the dynamic environments of, say, Fashionably Late for the Relationship (installation version) by R. Luke Dubois and Lián Amaris.
The Projection Project. Installation view. Curated by Edwin Carels, Mark Kre
And hopefully, Pfeiffer will at least mention his The Saints project, which remains an animating experience for me and taught me that even in a large-scale, public context, spectacular size is not everything. The visual element of The Saints was physically minor, even though critical to the overall experience.
“The signs were programmed in mirrored text with alternating speed to work in conjunction with the building’s glass surfaces at night. Using a ratio of sign speed and letter height, the appearance of the gallery roof was made even more dramatic; visual effects simulated the roof to bow, appear concave, convex, and even twisted.”
4 million visitors • 80 light projects • 8 million small candles sold in Greater Lyon • 3.5 million public transport users • 400 000 programmes broadcast on 14 television stations • more than 250 newspaper articles • 11 radio stations • the city hotels full for the 4 days of the Festival • 3 times the turnover for the city bars and restaurants compared to normal periods • 47 public and private partners – Lyons Fête des Lumières
Conception and production : TILT. My Public Garden.
“The slope of Grande-Côte is home to an extraordinary garden, inviting visitors to daydream and meditate.A fairy-tale promenade that starts at the bottom of the stairs with a green carpet of soft, suspended lights and continues all the way to the esplanade through a field of 44 giant, twinkling flowers in vivid colors, creating a warm, playful atmosphere like the one in a story for children. From the esplanade, you will have a magnificent view of this luminous garden and the entire festive city.” link
Robert Nortik. Sound design: Robert Clerc. La Dolce Vita.
“A tribute to the builders who, starting in the 12th century, would take over three hundred years to build the Saint-Jean Cathedral. Two gigantic hands, the leitmotif of this audiovisual scenography, mold the cathedral façade. From the original outline to the final sketch, spectacular effects and breathtaking realism will present the wealth of this cultural heritage.” link
Jacques Rival. 24- 365 Stars.
“365 anchor buoys floating on the Rhône. 365 intensely lighted navigation signals that bob with the continuous movement of the water. The surface of the river is constellated with sparkling white light, like a carpet of stars.” link
Martha Rosler Library "Books at the artist's home, 2005" via eflux
“Comprised of approximately 7,700 titles from the artist’s personal collection, the Library was opened to the public by Anton Vidokle in November 2005 as a storefront reading room at e-flux, on Ludlow Street in New York City. It has since traveled to Frankfurter Kunstverein; MuHKA, Antwerp; unitednationsplaza, Berlin; Institut National d’histoire de l’Art, Paris; the John Moores University, Liverpool; and the Stills Centre, Edinburgh. The Library will remain on view in Amherst through December 10th, 2009, after which the books will be finally return to Martha Rosler’s home.” via eflux
Unpacking My Library: 10 Architects & Their Books, Ric Diller + Liz Sccofidio
“Unpacking My Library: 10 Architects & Their Books. This exhibit by the MAS bookstore Urban Center Books takes a look at the libraries of some of the most influential New York architects working today. It documents the architects’ personal book collections, offering an intriguing look at what has influenced them intellectually. Throughout the next 12 months a different architect will be featured every month, and the exhibit opened in May with a look inside the library of controversial architect Peter Eisenman, and currently features the books of Ric Diller and Liz Scofidio.” via Municipal Art Society of New York
Airan Kang, "109 Lighting Books" in the group exhibition "Textual Landscapes" at Bryce Wolkowitz Gallery. Source: Bryce Wolkowitz Gallery via Rhizome.
Michael Mandiberg, FDIC Insured, 2009. Installation view, Eyebeam.
“This is “FDIC Insured” a collection of 130+ cast off investment books from the Strand dollar racks, engraved with the logos of all of the failed banks of the Great Recession. The work is primarily old found books cut with the laser cutter, as well as some laser cut drawings.” – Michael Mandiberg
Prelinger Library.
“An appropriation-friendly, image-rich, experimental research library. Independent and open to the public.” – via Prelinger Library Blog
University of Openess, Faculty of Taxonomy Library. Installation view, Banff Center Library for "Database Imaginary" exhibition.
“For Database Imaginary, the University of Openess – an online, open source, unaccredited university – inaugurated a Faculty of Taxonomy to work together with its other faculty (Cartography, Physical Education, Problem Solving) to investigate the naming and filing structures that permeate our lives. Faculty activities exhibited include take-away game sheets for playing “categories†and a distributed, anti-systemic library of readings about taxonomies and databases. Users are invited to contribute to and re-catalogue these readings. The Faculty of Taxonomy Library is exhibited within the Banff Centre Library.” – via Database Imaginary
Also
The above projects are more or less actual libraries. The library, of course is also a site for many artists.
