Hayward Gallery
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| Detail from Model for a timeless garden by Olafur Eliasson. From here. |
Appreciation of the effects of light appears to have gone
missing from contemporary art, and this selection of works from the last 30
years or so confirms this.
Simply celebrating light over darkness (or better, absence
of light) has been central to our visual culture. Poets, musicians and
philosophers may celebrate night but mostly reacting against what for most of
us is our unquestioned preference for daylight.
The artworks here also celebrate light, and as the curators
point out, are indeed comprised mostly of light, but it is dispiriting that the
light in question is entirely manufactured, either lightbulbs or neon or LEDs;
nowhere is there actual light from the sun, or the moon, or from candles / fires.
The quality of light links to another observation.
Depicting light’s effects in paint, or managing its effects
in sculpture and architecture, is a critical part of representational art, at
least in the Western tradition and since at least the Renaissance, but probably
on-and-off in all regions and across much larger epochs.
I’ve just returned from Venice, whose painters and
architects specialised in depicting and exploiting the effects of light in
their city.
Clearly this assumes that when we look at a Canaletto, we
see Venice, rather than small gradations of oil. Promisingly, the artists in
this exhibition use light itself, directly, rather than attempting to represent
light through oil.
Unfortunately the results are usually extremely crude, with
little of the refinement of earlier masters.
Three rooms in lit by different colours: a work of greater
subtlety than most in this outrageously popular exhibition. I accept the
visceral effect of walking from one light-infused section to another is
impressive, and the work also highlights our subjective experience of colour,
how this changes relative to our context.
But is that it? Doesn’t Monet make the same point in
infinitely finer style, to name unfairly just the greatest of possible
comparisons?
Two works here are definitely worth experiencing.
Wedgework V by James Turrell is a genuine sculpture in light, similar to Barnett
Newman’s paintings in the Tate, but even more hypnotic. But the artist requests
15 minutes of contemplation for the work to achieve full effect, which seems
exorbitant, and nobody else managed it when I was watching.
Model for a timeless garden by Olafur Eliasson is stunning, various mini water spouts illuminated by
white strobe lighting. For once, the cold ambience of the lighting really
helped, turning the water droplets into gleaming crystals. It is the kind of
marvel about which fables are written.
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