Merging Sound and Light art in new york
The latest solo show by Icelandic-Danish artist Olafur Eliasson, titled ‘Your psychoacoustic light ensemble,’ is now open at Tanya Bonakdar Gallery in New York. On view from from October 24th through December 19th, 2024, the exhibition showcases Eliasson’s recent work with two immersive light installations, a series of new watercolors, and two sculptural pieces, all of which invite viewers to reconsider their perceptions of light, color, and sound.
The ground-floor installation combines sound and light, offering visitors an experience that crosses sensory boundaries. Low-frequency vibrations create a spatial soundscape where soundwaves are both heard and felt, becoming visible as they interact with circles of light projected on a darkened wall. The play of light and sound invites the viewer to engage with sound visually, creating an immersive sensory interplay. The visible apparatuses driving these projections remind us of the mechanical origins of these seemingly magical effects, a signature touch in Eliasson’s installations.
Olafur Eliasson, Your psychoacoustic light ensemble, 2024
olafur eliasson Explores the Nature of Color Perception
Upon entering Olafur Eliasson’s ‘Your psychoacoustic light ensemble’ at Tanya Bonakdar Gallery in New York, visitors are greeted at once by a luminous sculptural work. Fierce Tenderness Sphere is a hanging sculpture which captures light through its intricate colored glass and color-effect filters. Formed from interlocking triangles arranged in a geodesic pattern, the sculpture shifts with every movement of the viewer. The glass panes reflect and refract light in a symphony of colors, while the delicate geometry of spirals and triangles creates an illusion of perpetual motion and transformation.
Upstairs, the artist continues his exploration of color perception with works that probe the individualized experience of color. In the skylit gallery, his large watercolor pieces feature layered pigments applied with precision to mimic the natural spectrum of a rainbow. The effect is an ethereal transition of hues that seems to emerge directly from the paper, immersing viewers in color. This body of work, like much of Eliasson’s, investigates how color perception is highly subjective and context-dependent, echoing his belief that color exists only in the presence of light and observer.
Olafur Eliasson, Your psychoacoustic light ensemble, 2024
Geometry and Reflection in Sculptural Forms
In an adjacent gallery, a columnar sculpture composed of five polyhedrons continues Olafur Eliasson’s study of color, light, and geometry. Each polyhedron incorporates both mirrored and colored glass panels that, when layered, generate a rich variety of hues within the primary color spectrum — cyan, magenta, and yellow. As light and reflection interact with the mirrors and glass, new colors emerge, creating a dynamic interplay of form and light.
The exhibition concludes with a projection work that spans the entire visible spectrum in a single band of light. This spectrum mirrors the colors found in natural rainbows but with an intensity rarely seen in nature. Projected at the artist’s eye level across a darkened room, the light evokes the horizon line — a recurrent theme in Eliasson’s work. For the artist, the horizon symbolizes an experiential boundary, one that follows the viewer’s gaze and expands endlessly around them.
Olafur Eliasson, Your psychoacoustic light ensemble, 2024
Olafur Eliasson, Probability of conscious antigravitation, 2023, (left) Seeing painting (periphery), 2024 (right)
installation view with watercolor works
