Art & Technology #2: Carsten Höller

Across the boundless realms of art and science

Seven Sliding Doors

The Gwangju Biennale is Korea’s most prestigious contemporary art event, a highlight of the international biennale circuit that consistently appoints highly talented curators to spotlight noteworthy artists. The Gwangju Biennale introduced several great names once again with this year’s edition, and among the participating artists, one stood out in particular: Carsten Höller.
Seven Sliding Doors, the Belgian artist’s new commission for the biennale’s 10th edition, is an installation in which visitors become the subject. A series of sliding doors with mirrored surfaces form an apparently endless passage for viewers to walk through—the perfect centerpiece for an encompassing installation.

The audience begins to experience the alternating expansion and reduction of the visual field once past the first set of doors, the glass opening in front of them before enclosing them in. Perceptions of the space change even further as the viewer’s image is reflected infinitely between the mirrored surfaces.
Höller finds and applies ideas from scientific research. His works modify physical sensations and psychological reactions, creating exhilarating, rollercoaster-like experiences.

The Maverick

Höller passes freely between the territories of art and science. He applies his own professional knowledge and expertise as a former scientist to his work. The 2011 “Carsten Höller: Experience” exhibition at the New Museum was a confident, audacious display of his ability. A comprehensive collection of the artist’s signature installations from 18 years of collaboration with the New York institution, the show was organized by Massimiliano Gioni and opened for three months from October 2011.
The New Museum is famous for its structural architecture, and by installing an indoor slide that spiraled through three gallery floors and the lobby, Höller presented the embodiment of viewer participation in art. The slide served as an alternative system for movement and transportation. In another section of the show, he invited the audience to float weightlessly in the water of a sensory deprivation pool, to bask in the sublimity of human behavior.

Double Light Corner (2011) created an immersive, almost hallucinatory experience that awakened one’s awareness of the surrounding space with a sequence of flickering lights, while Mirror Carousel (2005) presented viewers with a unique and radically physical experience quite unlike the traditional amusement park ride it borrowed from. The artist created the installation to reflect and illuminate the space surrounding it, encouraging visitors to ponder the meaning of play and participation.
Höller is one of the most symbolic and promising in a group of European artists active over the last two decades. His peers include Maurizio Cattelan, Dominique Gonzalez-Foerster, Pierre Huyghe and Philippe Parreno, who have all crossed borders in order to reimagine the artistic space and experience. Among them, Höller’s installations are unique in their inspiration from scientific experimentation, causing a sense of uncertainty in viewers by confusing their visual perception.

The Manipulator

A common thread found in all of Höller’s work is the origin of each piece in the artist’s academic research. For those who find the concepts of “play” and “happiness”—two of the artist’s major themes over the past 20 years—repetitive, Höller addresses them thusly: “The terms ‘happiness’ and ‘play’ have never been discussed in depth throughout the history of philosophy. Despite our emotions being so primal and influential in our lives, we have not yet taken an earnest look into it.” Through his work, Höller asks what gives rise to those emotions, and in what cultural and biological correlation they occur. And in so asking, the visitors become immediate participants as well as the test subjects of his art.

For the 1996 exhibition “Gluck,” which opened in Cologne at Kölnischer Kunstverein, Höller collected a variety of objects, machinery and tools in order to induce happiness within the exhibition space. Rotating swivels suspended from the ceiling, massage chairs, an aquarium and even mood-calming drugs were placed in the space, allowing visitors to individually experience each. He also placed his childhood self on display with a Super 9 film. Höller’s installation left visitors with the question of whether or not the emotion that arose from their experience actually aligned and signaled the term “happiness.”

The two works that segued into his iterations of the slide at the New Museum exhibition first found audience at the Tate Modern’s Turbine Hall and in San Severino Lucano, Italy. Test Site (2006), a 55 meter-long slide, and the public art piece RB Ride (2007), a merry-go-round, both visualize the concept of spiel, or play. Both of the large-scale installations presented visitors with excitement and exhilaration, as the artist felt the only way he could communicate his ideas was through physical, emotional, first-hand experience.
Höller refuses to be categorized. Breaking down boundaries is a theme that underlies his body of work: the boundaries between visitor and art, art and academia, academic expertise and generality. Yet he refuses to accept polarities, which is why he plays with and negotiates these lines.

Inspired by research, the artist manages to incorporate science into his work so that he can confound physical and psychological perceptions. This method provides a possible model for the future, using the artist’s suggestions and structures to pave a path for visitors to imagine the social and sensory possibilities of living space. Most recently, Höller has been focused on the creation of structures that humans share with animals such as livestock and insects, the results of which will be unveiled in his first major UK retrospective. The show is slated to open in 2015 at the London Hayward Gallery. ■ with ARTINPOST

<Golden mirror carousel>

2014 Powder-coated and painted steel, gold-plated stainless steel, tinite-plated stainless steel, brass, mirrors, light bulbs, electric motors, control unit, power unit, sandbags 480×745cm diameter(variable) Collection of the artist, Stockholm and Gagosian Gallery, New York Photo: Christian Markel Courtesy Gagosian Gallery ⓒ Carsten Höller
<Golden mirror carousel>

2014 Powder-coated and painted steel, gold-plated stainless steel, tinite-plated stainless steel, brass, mirrors, light bulbs, electric motors, control unit, power unit, sandbags 480×745cm diameter(variable) Collection of the artist, Stockholm and Gagosian Gallery, New York Photo: Christian Markel Courtesy Gagosian Gallery ⓒ Carsten Höller
<Golden mirror carousel>

2014 Powder-coated and painted steel, gold-plated stainless steel, tinite-plated stainless steel, brass, mirrors, light bulbs, electric motors, control unit, power unit, sandbags 480×745cm diameter(variable) Collection of the artist, Stockholm and Gagosian Gallery, New York Photo: Christian Markel Courtesy Gagosian Gallery ⓒ Carsten Höller
Carsten Holler with Avec Francois Roche <Hypothese de grue>

2013 Metallic structure, bi-resin, fabric, polystyrene, pvc, polyurethane foam, smoke machin, timer and various substances Dimensions variable Courtesy Air de Paris, Paris ⓒ Photo Marc Domage
Carsten Holler with Rigobert Nimi <Top Mode Africa>

2013 Metal foil, leaf colored cork, wood, oil painting, electrical Courtesy Air de Paris, Paris ⓒ Photo Marc Domage
Carsten Holler with Yves Gaumetou <Snake>

2013 Bi-Resin, glass eyes 174×18×60cm Courtesy Air de Paris, Paris ⓒ Photo Marc Domage
Carsten Holler with Ben Gorham <Insensatus Vol. 1 Fig. 1>

2013 Nordic walnut box, 4 tubes of coloured dental paste (white, red, blue and green), glass and wood vitrine
Box 25×5,5×17cm, vitrine 64,5×13×27cm, stand 64×40×26cm Edition 1/25 Courtesy Air de Paris, Paris ⓒ Photo Marc Domage
Carsten Holler with Ben Gorham <Insensatus Vol. 1 Fig. 1>

2013 Nordic walnut box, 4 tubes of coloured dental paste (white, red, blue and green), glass and wood vitrine
Box 25×5,5×17cm, vitrine 64,5×13×27cm, stand 64×40×26cm Edition 1/25 Courtesy Air de Paris, Paris ⓒ Photo Marc Domage
Exhibition view <With> at Air de Paris

Paris 2013 with Philippe Parreno, Francois Roche, Attilio Maranzano, Ben Gorham, Rigobert Nimi, Yves Gaumetou Courtesy Air de Paris, Paris ⓒ Photo Marc Domage
Exhibition view <With> at Air de Paris

Paris 2013 with Philippe Parreno, Francois Roche, Attilio Maranzano, Ben Gorham, Rigobert Nimi, Yves Gaumetou Courtesy Air de Paris, Paris ⓒ Photo Marc Domage
Exhibition view <With> at Air de Paris

Paris 2013 with Philippe Parreno, Francois Roche, Attilio Maranzano, Ben Gorham, Rigobert Nimi, Yves Gaumetou Courtesy Air de Paris, Paris ⓒ Photo Marc Domage
Exhibition view <With> at Air de Paris

Paris 2013 with Philippe Parreno, Francois Roche, Attilio Maranzano, Ben Gorham, Rigobert Nimi, Yves Gaumetou Courtesy Air de Paris, Paris ⓒ Photo Marc Domage
<Singing Canaries Mobile>

2009 Singing canaries, metal mobile, cage, metal wire, crank jack, wood, plastic, sand, clay ball, bird seed Plastic bottle 250×300×500cm, cage each 60×45×45cm Installation view at <Vogel Pilz Mathematik, Berlin Photo: Carsten Eisfeld
<Swinging Curve>

2009 Poly-ethylene panel, wood, metal wire 270×730×1460cm Installation view of <Fare Mondi/MakingWorlds, 53rd Venice Biennale> Photo: Per Kristiansen ⓒ VG Bild-Kunst, Bonn
<Giant Triple Mushrooms>

2009 Polyester mushroom replicas in various sizes, polyester paint, synthetic resin, acrylic paint, wire, putty, intumescent foam, stailness steel Dimensions variable Installation view of <Divided Divided> at Museum Boijmans Van Beuningen> Photo: Attilio Maranzano ⓒ VG Bild-Kunst, Bonn
<Test Site>

Stainless steel slides Installation view of <Carsten Höller: Test Site> at at Tate Modern Photo: Attilio Maranzano Countesy the artist, Tate Modern, London and Esther Schipper, Berlin ⓒ VG Bild-Kunst, Bonn
<RB Ride>

2007 Modified carousel car ride: steel, artificial leather, aluminum, fiberglass, colored plastic incandescent lights, electronic controls, electric motor (four revolutions per hour), cables Manufactor: Robles Bouso Atracciones S.A., Spain(Year of manufacture: 1969) 1,675×1,050cm Inatallation view at Arte Pollino, Un altro Sud, Paco Nazionale del Pollino, San Severino Lucano, Potenza Photo: San Severino Lucano ⓒ VG Bild-Kunst, Bonn
Installation view of <Soma> at Hamburger bahnhof-museum fur gegenwart

Berlin Photo: Attilio Maranzano ⓒ VG Bild-Kunst, Bonn
<Zollner Stripes>

2001 Black wall paint on white walls Dimensions variable Ed 4+1 AP Installation view of <Tne exposition a Marseille> at Musee d'Art Contemporain, Marseille
Photo: Attilio Maranzano ⓒ VG Bild-Kunst, Bonn
<Revolving Hotel Room>

2008 Transparent Acrlic glass, polypropylene, ball bearing, pivot, stand, electric motor, steel chain, sprocket wheel, HD video camera, metal weather protector, video signal, cable, DLP video projector etc. Structure 402×430×161cm Installation view of <Carrousel> at Kunsthaus Bregenz Photo: Markus Tretter ⓒ VG Bild-Kunst, Bonn

About the Artist

Born in 1961, Carsten Höller is a Belgian artist currently based in Cologne and Stockholm. He worked as a research entomologist after earning a doctorate in agricultural science from the University of Kiel. However, rejecting academia’s ivory walls built on objectivity and fact, he broke out onto the art scene in 1989 with an experimental style that combined elements of both art and science. Refusing the notion of a single, exclusive field, he began to present the relativity of visual perception through the medium of art. Since then, Höller has been invited to exhibit at the Venice Biennale (1993, 2005), the Berlin Biennale (1998), the Istanbul Biennial (2006) and the Sharjah Biennial (2013). His collaboration with Rosemarie Trockel at documenta X, Haus fur Schweine and Menschen (1997), caused a stir in the art world. At Art Basel in 2000, he presented Vincinato II, a video that attracted the public’s attention with collaborative works with such prominent contemporary artists as Liam Gillick, Douglas Gordon, Pierre Huyghe, Philippe Parreno and Rirkrit Tiravanija. Höller held major solo shows at the New Museum in 2011 and the Centre Pompidou in 2014.

Art & Technology #2: Carsten Höller

Seven Sliding Doors

The Maverick

The Manipulator

About the Artist

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