The long awaited James Turrell Skyspace, Light Reign, was unveiled to the public in July of 2003. Since then, it has been the site of numerous meditation sessions, a Quaker silent meeting, a performance art piece, an audio installation by artist Steve Roden, and thousands of individual visits. Combining architecture, sculpture, and atmosphere, the work is not only a spectacular addition to the museum√¢‚Ǩ‚Ñ¢s permanent collection, it is also now an important part of the building’s architecture.
Turrell’s work is meant to be taken in slowly, quietly, and over time. The Skyspace experience varies at different times of the year and different times of day. Visitors are encouraged to stop in again and again to sit back and absorb the effects of the Skyspace over the course of the seasons.
Visitors are also encouraged to swing by the Henry Art Gallery after dark to see the spectrum of intense colors that the exterior of the Skyspace emits when lit by thousands of computer controlled LED lights embedded in its glass panels.
WHO IS JAMES Turrell?
James Turrell is an internationally acclaimed light and space artist whose work can be found in collections worldwide. Since childhood, Turrell has been fascinated with the qualities of light.
Turrell√¢‚Ǩ‚Ñ¢s mother and grandmother were Quakers. When he was a child growing up in Pasadena, CA, he remembers his grandmother telling him what to do at a Quaker meeting: “Go inside and greet the light.” He majored in mathematics and perceptual psychology at Pomona College, Claremont, CA. He went on to study art at the University of California at Irvine. A recently re-lapsed Quaker, Turrell is also a long-time airplane pilot and rancher.
James Turrell uses light as his medium. Over more than three decades, he has created striking works that play with perception and the effect of light within a created space.
Turrell has said, “My work is about space and the light that inhabits it. It is about how you confront that space and plumb it. It is about your seeing.”
His large-scale, often architectural works incorporate the complex interplay of sky, light and atmosphere in motion across expanses of ocean, desert, and city. Loosely linked to the California light and space art movement, Turrell is best known for his monumental land art project at Roden Crater outside Flagstaff, AZ.
WHAT IS A Skyspace?
A James Turrell skyspace is a freestanding enclosed chamber large enough for about 15 people and designed and constructed with utmost precision to heighten our sense of sight and perception.
The Henry Art Gallery Skyspace is the very first to combine two aspects of James Turrell’s work: skyspace and exterior architectural illumination, making it accessible to viewers from both the inside and the outside. From the outside, the elliptical chamber becomes a luminous light work as the eighteen foot-high glass panels covering its exterior are softly illuminated from within with slowly changing color.
Inside the skyspace, visitors sit on a bench and view the sky and atmospheric changes through an opening in the roof. On rainy days a moveable dome covers the opening and a secondary light source creates a seemingly infinite visual space beyond the roof “aperture.”
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Los Angeles artist Steve Roden debuts a pair of sound art compositions created in response to James Turrell’s Skyspace at the Henry. These new works will be the latest in a series of works activating the spare forms of specific modern architectural structures with audio tracks composed of music and recorded sounds. day ring will be a durational listening experience at specific times during the museum’s regular hours. night ring will present a continuous soundscape for the area near the Skyspace at night. Quietly unfolding over several minutes, Roden’s work strives for a moment where visual, spatial, and aural perceptions become mutually enriching, deepening the experience of all three phenomena simultaneously.
Also on view are two recent videos by Roden. four words for four hands (apple.mountain.over.frozen) is a silent, vibrantly colorful meditation on the system of transcribing musical notes, by which the analytical process of reading music becomes a sensual visual experience. anything else &/or nothing at all (drawing circles for jackson mac low) layers Roden’s graphic translation of a fluxus composer’s score atop a 1950s art instruction film.
Tuesday through Sunday, day ring will play in the James Turrell Skyspace for approximately 45 minutes at the following times:
11:30 AM
1:45 PM
4:00 PM
6:15 PM (Thursdays only)
