21st Century Museum of Contemporary Art, Kanazawa

Since the early 1990s, Olafur Eliasson has pursued a diverse practice that includes photography, sculpture, drawing, installation, design, and architecture. He has gained international renown for his endeavors to realize a sustainable world through art.
This exhibition presents The exploration of the center of the sun, a work emerging from Eliasson’s interest in ecology and renewable energy, for the first time since the museum acquired it. The work consists of a glass-covered polyhedron and a photovoltaic unit (solar panels and a power supply system with storage batteries, etc.) A light source is mounted in the center of the work, and a light at the end of an arm protruding from the light source rotates slowly, illuminating the room as if the glass polyhedron, suspended in a fixed position in the center of the room, were rotating. The light from the glass polyhedron, to which are attached glittering polarizing filters developed by Studio Olafur Eliasson, projects a galaxy of reflections throughout the room that captivate viewers and immerse them in the world of the work. These movements of light evoke the relationship between the sun, the indispensable source of life, and the planets that orbit it, as well as our orientation toward the structures and laws that make our world’s existence possible. This work, powered by electrical energy generated by solar panels installed in the light courtyard, encourages us to reconsider traditional historical views of progress and new perspectives on sustainable development as we face drastic and irreversible changes in the global environment. We hope that this exhibition will encourage viewers to examine the role of art in an ecological context, while enjoying new and magical perceptual experiences created by a polyhedral compound and reflections of light.