Born in Denmark to Icelandic parents, Olafur Eliasson is best known for large-scale works that, in recreating natural phenomena, ask viewers to reconsider how they perceive their daily environments. In the "Weather Project" (2003), Eliasson installed a blinding sun — made of hundreds of mono-frequency lamps — at one end of the cathedral-like Tate Modern Turbine Hall in London. And for the "New York City Waterfalls Project" (2008), he erected man-made waterfalls along the New York waterfront. However, such works are not merely spectacle: They emerge from deep consideration of how to create communal experiences that also allow for individual reflection.
Eliasson has been a frequent visitor to Japan in recent years, with site-specific commissions such as "Sunspace for Shibukawa," a domelike observatory that turns sunlight into rainbow-hued, illusory sketches (unveiled at the Hara Museum ARC in Gunma Prefecture in October), and a solo exhibition at the Hara Museum of Contemporary Art in Tokyo in 2005-06.
Even as his mid-career retrospective continues to tour the world, Eliasson has created a body of new works for his latest project in Japan, an exhibition entitled "Your Chance Encounter" at the 21st Century Museum of Contemporary Art, Kanazawa, Ishikawa Prefecture. Many of the works in the exhibition were created in response to the museum's building, designed by the architecture firm SANAA. The Japan Times met with Eliasson at Hara Museum ARC and again in Kanazawa to discuss the ideas that inform his work.