Ryoji Ikeda. micro | macro

The opening is scheduled to take place on Sun, June 21, 2015 sat 2 pm!

As prelude to the »Infosphere«, the ZKM shows a large-scale exhibition by Ryoji Ikeda. The composer and artist is internationally one of the most important representatives of media art and experimental electronic music. He creates synaesthetic installations of sound and moving images. The series of works entitled »supersymmetry«, as well as »the planck universe« will be presented for the first time as a world premiere in the ZKM atriums 1 + 2 on an exhibition area of about 7,000 square meters. Both works were created during Ikeda’s research stay at the European Organization for Nuclear Research (CERN). The installations are synchronized with each other and transform the exhibition into a large audiovisual symphony. The rooms in the ZKM will be part of a monumental »super installation«.

Ikeda’s audiovisual works are characterized by a profound artistic exploration of human perception, the human scale and the very nature of sound. The artist analyzes the possibilities of new digital technologies. He is particularly interested in the limits and the basic shapes of sound – as an analyst, he reveals the physical principles of sound. Ikeda explores the audible to the limits of human perception and dissects it with the precision of a surgeon. The visualization of his sound art is intimately connected with the audible and thus forms an aesthetic unity. He creates highly aestheticized, abstract images that result in strict minimalism, the infosphere always in mind. Comparable to a hacker, he enters the world of data and makes its hidden essentials – its code – visible: unfolding data streams and abstract computational processes to envelop the viewer.
 

»supersymmetry« consists of 80 screens and forms a corridor in which visitors will be enwrapped by images. Mathematical and physical images appear like a flash of light and blinking, synchronized with sounds as well as the humming and droning of scientific equipment. A second part of the installation on the second floor directly above shows light boxes on which particles move over microscopic, brightly shining areas. The complex entanglements which ensue within this installation are reminiscent of the superposition principle in physics.

»the planck universe« consists of two overwhelming projections which unfold on an area of over 375 square meters. The installation explores human perception on the smallest microscopic level as well as the largest level of endless space beyond the observable universe. Pictorial worlds which have been enlarged to our proportions by the Planck scale can be perceived on the large-format floor projection of »the planck universe [micro]«. Scientists use the Planck scale to describe the smallest units of our universe, so-called “strings”. So while visitors enter an immersive area in »the planck universe [micro]«, in »the planck universe [macro]« they experience a macro scale of 1026 meters, which lies beyond the observable universe, by means of an immense wall projection over three floors with engaging sound.

The works at the ZKM are closely interwoven with architecture and exhibited synchronized with each other. While Ikeda still explicitly deals with the CERN’s research work in supersymmetry, in the planck universe commissioned by ZKM he immerses himself like never before in the physical theory beyond experimental practice. The field of tension and imagination exhibited by micro | macro unfolds in the realm between theoretical quantum physics, empirical experiments and human perception.