Sunshower, 2017

Sculpture, light, a video projection, dimensions variable. Year: 2017

 

The installation is originally conceived as an entrance sign, a gate, for the show ‘Sunshower’ at the Mori Museum. A life-size elephant sculpture is levitated at the atrium. It is modelled after Thailand’s royal white elephant, a rare occurrence deemed auspicious to the kingdom. With its eyes half closed, it appears to be in the midst of a dream or dead.

In the space floats a disk of changing colored lights and a video projection, creating a theater-like affect onto the space. The dramaturgy of colours and images suggests the ever-shifting of the narrative. This monumental work implies simultaneous layers of meanings, such as fact and fiction, physical and spiritual, existing and not existing, while transforming the exhibition hall into a mysterious, dreamlike space. It also seems to symbolize the ambiguities found in Southeast Asia, a region with a complicated historical and cultural background.