320º Light

John Hill
21. April 2014
Photo: Gasometer Oberhausen

Since its decommissioning in 1988 and subsequent transformation into a cultural venue six years later, the 100-meter-high Gasometer in Oberhausen, Germany, has been host to site-specific installations by Christo and Jeanne-Claude, Bill Viola, Wolfgang Volz, and other artists. Bremen's creative group URBANSCREEN is using more than 20 high-end video projectors to transform the 24-sided interior into what they call "an imaginary, ever-changing room." The short film above shows the way the artists turn the 20,000 square meters of surface area into an ever-changing canvas of light and geometry.

The installation "320º Light" continues URBANSCREEN's interest in "the optical illusion of physical transformations," which we explored in an interview with their members in 2012, but this time their canvas is a cathedral-like industrial relic rather than "urban surfaces" like the Bauhaus or the Sydney Opera House. Or as they describe it in The Creators Project video at bottom: "We no longer create pictures, we create spaces."

"320º Light" is on display until the end of 2014 as part of the larger "The Appearance of Beauty" exhibition inside the Gasometer Oberhausen.

Photo: Gasometer Oberhausen
Photo: Gasometer Oberhausen
Photo: Gasometer Oberhausen

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