UDTR Global Rights of Nature Radar

Containing the Infinite

Identification

Public canonical key

doi:10.1525/aft.2000.28.1.15a

Authors

Sarah Webb

Reported year

2000

Reported language

en

Source type

article

First detected

2026-11-09T19:14:14.250472+00:00

Last metadata observation

2026-11-09T19:14:14.250472+00:00

Last HTTP verification

Not checked

Documentary abstract — original language

Olafur Eliasson: New Work The Aldrich Museum of Contemporary Art Ridgefield, Connecticut January 23-April 30, 2000 To walk on a glacier is to be equally blinded by sunlight and scale. How to replicate such an environment is confounding; few have the opportunity to experience a glacier as [anything more than an image, a presence that remains indelibly frozen. Based in the realm of reproduction, the glacier only through, the distance of the photograph . . . now subject to transformations out of control of the creator and the beholder. [1] The glacier series (1999) is one of three new photographic works by Olafur Eliasson exhibited at the Aldrich Museum of Contemporary Art. Each piece relays an aspect of the artist's ongoing. concerns with spatial relationships and viewer engagement-how we respond to and interact with our environment Although currently living and working in Berlin, Eliasson's native Iceland was the backdrop for creating this work. Each piece is untitled, thus amplifying the notion of uncharted discovery. Yet within each work Eliasson also exposes the inherent contradiction of documenting nature: how to contain the seemingly infinite within the confines of both the picture frame and the architectural space of the gallery. Two of the exhibition's works, The glacier series and The lighthouse series (1999), are structured as grids. Through the repetition of similar imagery, one cannot help but reference the use of typology in photography specifically in the work of Bernd and Hula Becher. Perhaps most articulated in The lighthouse series, Eliasson's 20 photographs read as a highly composed, assembled observation. Within each frame, a lighthouse is recorded from a similar focal length, centrally grounded, the horizon line an unwavering continuum. In such a depiction the viewer is not a tourist, but rather a scientist ranking each lighthouse against each of the others as variations of a specific class or subset Eliasson's use of color both within individual images and throughout the groupings resonates. The banding of primary reds and yellows interspersed with white and accentuated against the clarity of a blue sky can be interpreted as naval signal flags. The strong vertical, horizontal and diagonal patterning throughout the grid composition encode a language to those who rely on the lighthouse as a beacon to chart travel. As such, Eliasson's images of lighthouses are weighted in both the tradition of typology. and that of topography. Although the lighthouse exists in architectural isolation, it cannot compare to the emptiness of the glacial field. In lieu of actual human proportions, the glacier can be interpreted as an enormous body. Eliasson's point of focus is the tongue, the geological term for glacial movement in which a mountain snowcap melts, runs down into ,a valley and refreezes. [2] The glacier series is a grid comprised of 40 aerial photographs of various parts of the tongue. One engages with the entire formation of the tongue as it gently caresses the earth. The photographs provide viewers with a unique angle in which to observe the properties of water. The interplay of ice and cloud formations questions our traditional perspective of foreground and background as form and shadow abstractly collide with one another. Water is also reminiscent of life's primal places, such as the womb. The photographs have a strong resemblance to Sally Mann's The Ditch (1987), in which her child lies in a narrow canal between a small pond and the wet sandy shore, suggestive of the act of expulsion, and a clinging to the maternal familiar. Eliasson's glacial photographs convey 'the potential to conjure what is both known through photographs yet is dramatically untraveled by humans, perhaps as a reminder as Assistant Curator Jessica Hough states that this icy view [was] not intended for human eyes. …

Identifiers

OPENALEX

W260887659

DOI

10.1525/aft.2000.28.1.15a

Documentary context

Documentary family

Scholarship

Source-reported types

article

Natural entities mentioned

Mountain · Glacier

Entity mentions are not evidence of legal recognition. Jurisdiction studied is separate from author affiliation country.

Sources

OpenAlex · Record 1 · Record 2

• DOI · https://doi.org/10.1525/aft.2000.28.1.15a
• OpenAlex · https://openalex.org/W260887659

Documentary status

Relevance pending

Library

This identity is not yet included in the Legal Library.