Olafur Eliasson: Contact Fondation Louis Vuitton, Paris

Designed by Frank Gehry and having opened to the public in October 2014, Fondation Louis Vuitton is now launching the second phase of its inaugural programme with an expansive exhibition of work by artist and inventor of Little Sun, Olafur Eliasson.

Eliasson is best known for Little Sun, the solar-powered light he developed with engineer Frederik Ottesen for use in off-grid areas of the world, allowing deprived communities to work, cook, eat and educate after dusk. Little Sun was launched at Tate Modern, as part of the London 2012 Festival, and has been presented at events around the world.

Curated by Suzanne Pagé and standing as Eliasson’s first solo show in France since his 2002 exhibition at Paris’ Musée d’Art moderne de la Ville, Contact explores “the relations between self, space, and universe” by creating a cosmos within the Fondation. An immersive exhibition, it will envelop visitors in a choreography of moving light and shadows, seemingly transporting them into the darkness of outer space. A number of small optical devices distributed throughout specially built passageways continue the artist’s on-going investigations into the mechanisms of perception, synesthesia and the construction of space.

Moving outside of the Fondation, Olafur Eliasson will install an apparatus upon the roof that tracks the sun and, at certain hours of the day, directs light rays onto a multifaceted, geometric sculpture suspended within the building. The exhibition will also interact with the newly unveiled site-specific commission Inside the Horizon, a vibrant interplay of daylight, yellow light, shadows, and reflections that offers constantly changing perspectives of the Fondation’s architecture, the surroundings, and each visitor himself.

Olafur Eliasson: Contact, until 16 February 2015, Fondation Louis Vuitton, 8 Avenue du Mahatma Gandhi, 75116 Paris, France.

Credits
1. Inside the Horizon, 2014, Olafur Eliasson, Fondation Louis Vuitton.