Stepping off a bustling Mayfair street into Pace Gallery for the much anticipated preview of TeamLab's 'Transcending Boundaries', we are plunged unexpectedly into darkness. Hands trace along blackout curtains, until one gives way, and we are ushered into a large room filled with disorientating light and music.
We've travelled into a parallel world, or at least, a future version of this one. The rules of nature are different; butterflies glow neon, flowers bloom on demand, and, as TeamLab's founder Toshiyuki Inoko explains, 'In order for ideas and concepts to be expressed in the real world. It is necessary to have a physical material substance through which they are mediated. We are seeking to eliminate these boundaries.'
’Universe of Water Particles’, by TeamLab, 2017
In the first of four rooms, the real world is left behind. A waterfall of light pours from the ceiling and across the floor, parting where gallery-goers walk. With the lightest touch of the hand, the water's direction mesmerically changes, turning torrents into syphons. Around this, a kaleidoscope of butterflies grows in number as more people enter the room. But they die when touched, 'serving as a reminder of the destructive side to humanity,' explains Pace London director Tamara Corm. When left alone, they dance to the soundtrack of therapeutic music.
In the second room, we are plunged once again into blackness, and for the first time, into silence. Unlike the preceding room, it's vacant of life, except for a panorama of rolling, tumultuous waves. 'It's almost like you're inside them, swimming under water,' Corm explains.
’Dark Waves’, by TeamLab, 2017
The calm after the storm, the third room is a small, square box overwhelmed by white light. It feels like stepping inside an Edmund de Waal installation. 'Digital technology allows art to break free from the frame,' Inoko explains, emphasising that despite the novel techniques and interactivity, the installations are still very much artworks. They're grounded in artistic heritage. In particular, they reference traditional Japanese art. Themes of flowers, cherry blossoms and woodblock waves are re-actualised for today.
At first, it seems there's nothing at all of note in the final room, until you see your sleeves lighting up and realise the artwork is being projected onto yourself. Stay still, and flowers will grow like ivy across your arms, chest and face. Move too quickly and, like the butterflies, they will shrink to nothing.
Visitors become playfully caught up with interacting with the installations, that how they're achieved seems quite unimportant. But afterwards the question returns and lingers. Inoko lets little on. 'The optimal technology is selected and developed accordingly,' he offers, cryptically. 'We do not think that technology is the most important element. We are interested in how art can be extended through the use of digital technology.'
Impermanent Life, 2017
Flowers Bloom on People, 2017
Flowers and People, 2017
INFORMATION
’Transcending Boundaries’ is on view until 11 March. For more information, visit the Pace Gallery website
ADDRESS
Pace Gallery
6 Burlington Gardens
London W1S 3ET
-
The Park: step inside Jeremy King's mid-century dinerOne of several 2024 openings from restauranteur, Jeremy King, food critic Ben McCormack books in at The Park
-
Six brilliant bars for your 2025 celebrations, hot off the Wallpaper* travel deskWallpaper’s most-read bar reviews of the year can't be wrong: here’s inspiration for your festive and new year plans, from a swanky Las Vegas lounge to a minimalist London drinking den
-
Misfires and Monstrosities: three vehicular design disasters that show taste is in retreatFrom a multi-million dollar piece merchandise to a wretched Rolls-Royce, these are the low points of the year in transportation design
-
Inside the distorted world of artist George RouyFrequently drawing comparisons with Francis Bacon, painter George Rouy is gaining peer points for his use of classic techniques to distort the human form
-
‘I'm endlessly fascinated by the nude’: Somaya Critchlow’s intimate and confident drawings are on show in London‘Triple Threat’ at Maximillian William gallery in London is British artist Somaya Critchlow’s first show dedicated solely to drawing
-
Surrealism as feminist resistance: artists against fascism in Leeds‘The Traumatic Surreal’ at the Henry Moore Institute, unpacks the generational trauma left by Nazism for postwar women
-
Looking forward to Tate Modern’s 25th anniversary partyFrom 9-12 May 2025, Tate Modern, one of London’s most adored art museums, will celebrate its 25th anniversary with a lively weekend of festivities
-
Out of office: what the Wallpaper* editors have been doing this weekA week in the world of Wallpaper*. Here's how our editors have been entertaining themselves in the run up to Christmas
-
Love, melancholy and domesticity: Anna Calleja is a painter to watchAnna Calleja explores everyday themes in her exhibition, ‘One Fine Day in the Middle of the Night’, at Sim Smith, London
-
Ndayé Kouagou speaks the language of the chaotic social media influencer in LondonNdayé Kouagou celebrates meandering incoherence with an exhibition, ‘A Message for Everybody’, at Gathering in London
-
Out of office: what the Wallpaper* editors have been doing this weekA snowy Swiss Alpine sleepover, a design book fest in Milan, and a night with Steve Coogan in London – our editors' out-of-hours adventures this week
