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World illuminator, 2014 - Bauhaus-Archiv, Berlin 2014 - Photo: SHIMURAbros
World illuminator, 2014
Bauhaus-Archiv, Berlin 2014
Photo: SHIMURAbros
World illuminator, 2014 - Bauhaus-Archiv, Berlin 2014 - Photo: Alcuin Stevenson / Studio Olafur Eliasson
World illuminator, 2014
Bauhaus-Archiv, Berlin 2014
Photo: Alcuin Stevenson / Studio Olafur Eliasson
World illuminator, 2014 - Bauhaus-Archiv, Berlin 2014 - Photo: Alcuin Stevenson / Studio Olafur Eliasson
World illuminator, 2014
Bauhaus-Archiv, Berlin 2014
Photo: Alcuin Stevenson / Studio Olafur Eliasson
World illuminator, 2014 - Bauhaus-Archiv, Berlin 2014 - Photo: SHIMURAbros
World illuminator, 2014
Bauhaus-Archiv, Berlin 2014
Photo: SHIMURAbros
World illuminator, 2014 - Bauhaus-Archiv, Berlin 2014 - Photo: SHIMURAbros
World illuminator, 2014
Bauhaus-Archiv, Berlin 2014
Photo: SHIMURAbros
World illuminator, 2014 - Bauhaus-Archiv, Berlin 2014 - Photo: Alcuin Stevenson / Studio Olafur Eliasson
World illuminator, 2014
Bauhaus-Archiv, Berlin 2014
Photo: Alcuin Stevenson / Studio Olafur Eliasson
World illuminator, 2014 - Bauhaus-Archiv, Berlin 2014 - Photo: Alcuin Stevenson / Studio Olafur Eliasson
World illuminator, 2014
Bauhaus-Archiv, Berlin 2014
Photo: Alcuin Stevenson / Studio Olafur Eliasson
World illuminator, 2014 - Bauhaus-Archiv, Berlin 2014 - Photo: Alcuin Stevenson / Studio Olafur Eliasson
World illuminator, 2014
Bauhaus-Archiv, Berlin 2014
Photo: Alcuin Stevenson / Studio Olafur Eliasson
World illuminator, 2014 - Fondation Louis Vuitton, Paris 2014 - Photo: Alcuin Stevenson / Studio Olafur Eliasson
World illuminator, 2014
Fondation Louis Vuitton, Paris 2014
Photo: Alcuin Stevenson / Studio Olafur Eliasson
World illuminator, 2014 - Fondation Louis Vuitton, Paris 2014 - Photo: Alcuin Stevenson / Studio Olafur Eliasson
World illuminator, 2014
Fondation Louis Vuitton, Paris 2014
Photo: Alcuin Stevenson / Studio Olafur Eliasson
World illuminator, 2014 - Fondation Louis Vuitton, Paris 2014 - Photo: Alcuin Stevenson / Studio Olafur Eliasson
World illuminator, 2014
Fondation Louis Vuitton, Paris 2014
Photo: Alcuin Stevenson / Studio Olafur Eliasson
World illuminator, 2014 shining sunlight onto Stardust particle - Fondation Louis Vuitton, Paris 2014 - Photo: Alcuin Stevenson / Studio Olafur Eliasson
World illuminator, 2014 shining sunlight onto Stardust particle
Fondation Louis Vuitton, Paris 2014
Photo: Alcuin Stevenson / Studio Olafur Eliasson
Test build-up of World illuminator, 2014 - Studio Olafur Eliasson, 2013 - Photo: Studio Olafur Eliasson
Test build-up of World illuminator, 2014
Studio Olafur Eliasson, 2013
Photo: Studio Olafur Eliasson
Test build-up of World illuminator, 2014 - Studio Olafur Eliasson, 2013 - Photo: Studio Olafur Eliasson
Test build-up of World illuminator, 2014
Studio Olafur Eliasson, 2013
Photo: Studio Olafur Eliasson
Test build-up of World illuminator, 2014 - Studio Olafur Eliasson, 2013 - Photo: Studio Olafur Eliasson
Test build-up of World illuminator, 2014
Studio Olafur Eliasson, 2013
Photo: Studio Olafur Eliasson
Sketch for exhibition Contact, 2014
Sketch for exhibition Contact, 2014
SHIMURAbros filmed a poetic meditation on Eliasson’s work ‘World illuminator’, 2014, at the Bauhaus Archiv in the fall of that year. The work was conceived for the Archiv’s courtyard as part of the group exhibition ‘Sensing the Future: László Moholy-Nagy, die Medien und die Künste’.

SHIMURAbros are the filmmaking siblings Yuka and Kentaro Shimura. Their work has been exhibited worldwide at venues such as the National Arts Center, Tokyo; the National University of Singapore’s Centre for the Arts, NTU Centre for Contemporary Art Singapore; The Museum of Contemporary Art, Taipei; The Hessel Museum of Art and CCS Bard Galleries in New York; the Perth Institute of Contemporary Arts; and Museums Quartier, Vienna. SHIMURAbros are the filmmaking sibling duo Yuka and Kentaro Shimura. Their work has been exhibited worldwide at venues such as the National Arts Center, Tokyo; the National University of Singapore’s Centre for the Arts, NTU Centre for Contemporary Art Singapore; The Museum of Contemporary Art, Taipei; The Hessel Museum of Art and CCS Bard Galleries in New York; the Perth Institute of Contemporary Arts; and Museums Quartier, Vienna.
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World illuminator is an artwork that redirects sunlight onto a fixed point by adjusting a mirror in concert with the ‘movement’ of the sun across the sky. In development at the artist’s studio for a number of years, the apparatus belongs to a family of optical devices called sun trackers and known formally as heliostats – a word deriving from Greek roots that mean stationary sun.
Eliasson emphasizes the sun tracker’s ability to make explicit a unique position on earth as it revolves the sun. The normal ‘movement’ of the sun through a room, after all, is no movement of the sun, but rather the optical result of the movement of the room on the rotating earth. The sun tracker thus links artwork and visitor to the earth’s surface, to the weather environments that determine the visibility of the sun, and to the broader planetary cosmos beyond.
In his words: ‘To track the sun is to track yourself, because the sun tracker locates the centre of your orbital ellipse, giving your position right now and rendering visible your path. The reflexive potential lies in understanding that we are in a way the mirrors, circulating, tracking, spinning in our Keplerian ellipses. You and I are not the centre of the universe, but in fact spinning in altruistic space.’

Artwork details

Title

World illuminator

Year

2014

Materials

Mirror, tripod, steel, motors, control unit, custom electronics, software