Olafur Eliasson's new light sculptures illuminate Los Angeles

While artists often hope to control the way their work is received, a survey of mostly new work by Olafur Eliasson takes a different stand in its title: 'Open'. His exhibition at the Museum of Contemporary Art in Los Angeles, many years in preparation, includes 11 new pieces that invite participation without prejudice. Simply walk into the vast darkened galleries and be immersed in the effects of light as it is transformed by prisms, mirrors or LEDs into pure experience. 'Open' is also the title of a giant rainbow, glowing on a wall, that is produced by a round prism milled by the artist. 'A rainbow is actually a circle that only appears to be an arch because of the horizon line. In this case, the floor of the gallery is what keeps the rainbow from being a full circle,' he explains.

Some of his new light sculptures are housed in hollow towers up to 40 feet tall and constructed roughly with materials leftover from a previous exhibition. Attached to the building’s existing skylights, they act as kaleidoscopes offering beautiful warnings of the earth’s fragility. One piece titled 'Observatory for seeing the atmosphere’s futures' presents the illusion of a sphere, a floating planet, whose tonalities shift according to the weather and the time of day.

The sculpture titled 'Viewing machine for imagining oceanic futures' startles with a view of the sky being flooded with water. 'I have a wave machine on the roof of the building so it is as if we were submerged underwater,' he explains.

Eliasson, who is Icelandic/Danish and living in Berlin, experienced early notoriety for his 2003 'Weather Project' in the Tate Turbine Hall. Since then, he has grown increasingly rigorous in his efforts at sustainability in an art world known for extravagant waste. He praises MOCA director Johanna Burton for being unusually sensitive to the environmental impact of exhibition staging. 'This is the first museum we have collaborated with which was at the level of our standards. That’s also kind of open.'

He explains the show’s capitalised title: OPEN. 'Some museums come across as being elitist and unavailable. Being open is being hospitable. It’s to exercise your interest in listening. Polarisation has been normalised. I declare myself the position of being free to not polarise, right? Within our vulnerability, there is the potential of courage. What’s the most courageous thing you did? It is asking for help.'

'Have the courage to lower your own defenses. The openness that we carry within ourselves is behind an armour, a social mask. I think fundamentally people are good. But if we leave no space for that to flourish, it’s going to be hard to cultivate.”

It is a busy year for Eliasson who is having exhibitions simultaneously at the elegant Istanbul Modern and the Singapore Art Museum. The presentation in L.A., organised in part by MOCA curators José Luis Blondet and Rebecca Lowery as part of the Getty-funded PST art initiative 'Art and Science Collide', is dramatically different and immensely personal. The warehouse was transformed in 1982 by then emerging architect Frank Gehry. Named the Temporary Contemporary, (now the Geffen Contemporary) it was designed for use only until the permanent MOCA, designed by Arata Isozaki, opened in 1984. However, its appeal to artists and curators, due to massive undivided spaces and high ceilings, led the museum to maintain it as a secondary site. Significant for Eliasson, Moca was a conceived as an artist’s museum, with artists participating in all the early discussions about its development. One of the most important and vocal was Robert Irwin, (1928-2023) the pioneer of West Coast perceptually-driven art and a prime early influence on Eliasson. 'Well, it's coming full circle with me,' he says. 'I could not be more proud.'

Because of the artist’s lengthy connection to L.A., this particular exhibition has given him added perspective. 'As an artist, I’ve been around for about 30 years. The gratitude I have, I’ve decided to transform it into tenderness, rather than monumentalism.'

Olafur Eliasson's new exhibition, 'Open,' is at the Museum of Contemporary Art in Los Angeles until July 6 2025

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