Eliasson’s impressive color experimentation is seen in his watercolor works The melting globe (vanadium yellow), Your echo tracer, The trace of my echo, and The melting globe (cadmium yellow, grey), all achieved in 2017. The artist placed pieces of ancient glacial ice on the surface of the paintings, and waited for them to gradually melt and displace the pigments. The result formed abstract figures that seemed to swell and fade organically. The ice was taken from large blocks of glacial ice fished from the Greenland coast.

Olafur Eliasson, From left: The melting globe (vanadium yellow), 2017; Your echo tracer, 2017, Courtesy: neugerriemschneider, Berlin; Tanya Bonakdar Gallery, New York / Los Angeles; The trace of my echo , 2017, The melting globe (cadmium yellow, grey), 2017, Photo: Alma Reyes

Finally, we enter into a dark space with a length of over 20 meters, and illuminated by moving strobe light. In Your split second house (2010), the strobe lights illuminate arcs of flowing water on the ground and produce momentary, three-dimensional drawings in the space. The abstract interpretation of the curves of water generates a new geometric form. Eliasson theorizes that a split second is the space between two seconds. We experience the gap between past and future, and the void in between appears to be static, frozen in time. Humans can, however, change the way we relate to subjects and objects, exterior and interior spaces, gravity and antigravity.

Olafur Eliasson, Your split second house, 2010, Courtesy: neugerriemschneider, Berlin; Tanya Bonakdar Gallery, New York / Los Angeles, Photo: Christian Uchtmann

In the office lobby of Mori JP Tower, Eliasson’s A harmonious cycle of interconnected nows of four suspended sculptures float from the ceiling approximately 15 meters high. The pieces are constructed in repeating geometric modules of dodecahedrons, rhombi, kites and triangles, calculated mathematically. The trajectory of a single point twists and moves freely as though emphasizing a centripetal force in the movement of people. Eliasson conjured up an experimental method of casting recycled metals to build the installation.

Don’t miss The Kitchen café restaurant in the lower floor of Garden PlazaA. The interior was designed in collaboration with Eliasson himself. The menus are concocted by reduction of CO2 emission. We can also witness overhead ceiling lights by Eliasson in the cafe and museum shop.

Olafur Eliasson: A harmonious cycle of interconnected nows
Date: November 24th, 2023 – March 31st, 2024
Opening Hours: 10:00 – 18:00 (Friday, Saturday, Day before a Public Holiday till 20:00)
Place: Azabudai Hills Gallery
Address: 1-3-1 Azabudai, Minato-ku, Tokyo
Tel: +81 (0)3 6402 5460
https://www.azabudai-hills.com