Last week, Ryoji Ikeda’s exhibit “data-verse” had its United States debut at the High Museum of Art in Atlanta, Georgia. This multi-room installation offers an immersive light and sound experience constructed from an amalgamation of data.
Japanese artist Ryoji Ikeda is one of the world’s leading contemporary composers and media artists, and has developed this series of works by analyzing and recombining information. Visuals are built using open-source data from institutions such as NASA, CERN, and the Human Genome Project.
Situated in three “chapters,” data sets have been transformed via self-written programs into visual output. Ikeda then synchronized the visuals and composed an electronic score to accompany the projections.
Last week, I attended the media preview of Ikeda’s “data-verse” at the High Museum of Art. A series of transitions greeted me once I made it through the front doors of the museum.
First, the airy and bright lobby was teeming with children and their parents lined up and excited for Toddler Thursdays. From there, a short elevator ride offered views of the downtown skyline as we rose to the second floor. The doors opened, revealing a dim hallway. The first impression I had of the exhibit was of flickering light and a sort of wobbly hum emanating from behind a wall.
Entering the first gallery was a bit of a shock to the system. From dimly lit to straight up dark, the small space felt tight and was surrounded by looming black walls. Centered around a pulsing light that seemingly shoots clear through a giant monolithic white structure, I found the experience of standing in such a confined and stark space to be jarring.
Following that experience, the next portion of the exhibit offered a bit of relief from the closeness and intensity of the first space. Within a significantly larger – but still very dark – room exists a large glowing square on the floor. Pulsing circles radiate in and out atop the square while a cacophonous sound plays from somewhere near the ceiling.
The experience of walking through these first two rooms made me feel similar to the sensations of when I’m on an airplane that is mid-take off or landing. Whooshing sounds and pulsing lights seemed to trigger some sort of internal pressure changes that made it difficult to think about anything else; I remained singularly focused on the imagery in front of me.
Down a short hallway beyond the square of light, what little ambient light there is fades away to nothing. At the end of the space is a tall, thin, glowing white line that reaches from the floor to the ceiling. While the sounds and lights from surrounding rooms of the exhibit could still be experienced from this space, I found the dark and otherwise quiet hallway offered a moment of brief respite.
The main gallery of the “data-verse” exhibition offers a vastly different visual experience than the first three rooms, with a long expansive space lined by three gigantic projections. Cycling through, at any given time, are visuals that swirl, build, and grow. Scenes that look like galaxies, planets, and fire explode, expand, disappear, reappear, rotate across the screens. Data points form giant clouds on the screen, their details indecipherable but beautiful nevertheless.
Standing in this space, you feel small. And that kind of makes sense, because you’re looking at a projected video of a galaxy which is mind-numbingly huge compared to one human. In a way, it recenters you, reminds you of the infiniteness of existence, and encourages you to seek out some kind of connection or explanation for the data on the screens.
Through the main exhibition space and around another corner is another, longer hallway. Dimly lit but featuring white walls instead of black, the more traditional white-walled gallery space serves as a gentle transition back to the rest of the world; outside of the “data-verse.”
Visitors stopped in this hallway and stared at the mounted television screens that displayed data from the exhibit, studying them as if to decipher them. I learned later that Ikeda doesn’t like to tell viewers explicitly what his work means or the data’s meaning, and instead prefers for everyone to have their own experience with the work.
The last space in the exhibit, a more traditional exhibition space that you might expect to see at the High, featured light tables with negatives displaying charted data and loops or magnifiers that the artist may have used to analyze the data. On the walls surrounding the tables are striking black and white works that represent the data as fine art pieces.
After we toured the exhibit, High’s Wieland Family Senior Curator of Modern and Contemporary Art Michael Rooks and Denis Pernet, Art Curator at Audemars Piguet since November 2018, discussed the project from the Taylor Lobby.
“We are really proud of this exhibition,” said Rooks, highlighting the exhibit design and the ways in which it complements the work. “We’ve been really pushing the envelope.”
Rooks explained that he first experienced Ikeda’s work in Taipei around seven years ago, and said he was “delightfully taken by surprise.” Now, it is enjoying its first American debut at the High.
I learned that “Ryoji Ikeda: data-verse” was first commissioned by Audemars Piguet for the Venice Biennale in 2019, and the exhibit has added parts 2 and 3 in the years since. It was initially displayed in its completed form in 2021 in London.
Describing the works as “an immersive sound and visual experience,” Rooks highlighted the difficulty of conveying some of the data included in this exhibit as a visual artform. “How do you express something that’s invisible, or infinity?” he wondered aloud.
Rooks explained that by using mathematics, Ikeda is able to express infinity through codas, a musical term meaning a passage that ends a movement. Rooks also pointed out that while Ikeda doesn’t prescribe the meaning or elucidate on the data compiled for his pieces, the titles of the works can be clues. For instance, in the last gallery there’s a reference to 4’33” which is a famous musical composition by John Cage.
Audemars Piguet, a Swiss luxury watch manufacturing company, has been funding international art installations for their fine art initiative Audemars Piguet Contemporary since 2012. In the years since, they have worked with 26 international artists and more than 70 institutions around the world.
Representing the brand, Pernet explained that in this program artists retain ownership, allowing them to explore new territories. The company views funding contemporary art as a “philosophical quest” and part of their commitment to remain involved in culture and art.
He went on to explain that the exhibit has “an impact on the entire body,” and by walking through the exhibit’s auditory and visual displays, you can have an experience deeper than any initial sensory input, thanks to the frequencies Ikeda chose which trigger brain responses.
Pernet thanked Rooks, and the High Museum of Art, for the thoughtful choices they made surrounding the installation and display of “Ryoji Ikeda: data-verse.”
“Here it is really extremely beautifully presented,” said Pernet. The crowd agreed.
“Data-verse” will remain on view at the High Museum of Art through August 10, 2025. This exhibit is one that can’t truly be fully understood unless you experience it in person, so make a plan to visit before it moves on from Atlanta later this year. Learn more about “data-verse” on the High Museum of Art website.
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