There’s been plenty of oohing and ahhing over the opening of New York’s Museum of Math, and for good reason. It’s remarkable how fun math can be in the hands of the right curator. To wit: The inaugural installation by artist and perceptual scientist Matthew Brand. Brand is the inventor of something called the specular hologram, a type of optical illusion that tricks your eye into thinking a 2-D object is 3-D.
Tokujin Yoshioka - Rainbow Church, 2006-2010
Artist’s statement:
“The idea of this architecture project “Rainbow Church” dates back to when I was in early 20s.
When I was in France for a business trip, I went to Vence, a commune located near Nice. There, I visited the Chapelle du Rosaire, which Henri Matisse, a French painter, created in his last years. I was engrossed in the beauty of the light that the chapel created.
I experienced a space filled with the light of Matisse: Being bathed in the sunlight of the Provence, the stained glass with Matisse’s vibrant colors suffused the room with full of colors. Since then, I had been dreaming of designing an architecture where people can feel the light with all senses.
This dreaming architecture project will be realized as a concept plan at the exhibition held at MUSEUM. beyondmuseum in Seoul from May, 2010. The exhibition is planned to last until the end of June. A 8-meter-high stained glass made with approximately 500 crystal prisms will be filling the space with rainbow colors as the light shines on it.”
