Thumbnails Images Information
Presence, 2025, work in progress - Studio Olafur Eliasson, Oberschöneweide, Berlin – 2025 - Photo: Studio Olafur Eliasson / Ágoston Horányi
Presence, 2025, work in progress
Studio Olafur Eliasson, Oberschöneweide, Berlin – 2025
Photo: Studio Olafur Eliasson / Ágoston Horányi
Presence, 2025 - QAGOMA, Brisbane – 2025 - Photo: Nicholas Umek © QAGOMA
Presence, 2025
QAGOMA, Brisbane – 2025
Photo: Nicholas Umek © QAGOMA
Presence, 2025 - QAGOMA, Brisbane – 2025 - Photo: Nicholas Umek © QAGOMA
Presence, 2025
QAGOMA, Brisbane – 2025
Photo: Nicholas Umek © QAGOMA
Presence, 2025 - QAGOMA, Brisbane – 2025 - Photo: Nicholas Umek © QAGOMA
Presence, 2025
QAGOMA, Brisbane – 2025
Photo: Nicholas Umek © QAGOMA
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Presence, 2025

An enormous glowing sphere seems to hover in space, its patterned yellow surface rippling and changing as viewers move around it. The illusion is created by mounting one eighth of a sphere to three abutting mirrors in the corner of a room. The mirrors multiply the fragment into a full sphere that appears to extend from the actual space into the virtual world through the looking glass. The sphere is illuminated from within by yellow, monofrequency light, which floods the room in the same colour and limits viewer’s colour perception to shades of yellow, black, and grey. The illusion of movement on the surface is produced by moiré patterns, a vibrating effect that occurs wherever two or more similar patterns are overlaid and clash. It is familiar as an artefact in printing and on the screen, and, in the physical world, in overlapping meshes and fences. As visitors move about, the pattern appears to change as their perspectives shift. The pattern was inspired by high-resolution images of the bubbling convection cells on the surface of the sun taken in 2020 using the Daniel K. Inouye Solar Telescope.

Artwork details

Title

Presence

Year

2025

Materials

Stainless steel, aluminum, monofrequency lights, printed textile wedges, aluminum perforated sheets, mirror foil, glass mirror, wood