Olafur Eliasson - Contemporary Art London Thursday, June 21, 2007 | Phillips

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  • Provenance

    Tanya Bonakdar Gallery, New York

  • Literature

    D. Birnbaum, M. Grynsztejn; M. Speaks, Olafur Eliasson, New York, 2002, p. 65 (illustrated)

  • Catalogue Essay

    “These individual photographs usually function as part of a larger ensemble, being grouped according to subject types and displayed in an overall, non-hierarchical grid pattern. Looked at one at a time, each of them displays in rich detail the idiosyncratic features of a particular aspect of nature. When they are configured as a group, becoming co-dependent, their more formal aspects come to the fore, such as their equality of scale, their generally similar forms and shapes, the overall consistent horizon line that turns the ensemble into a lateral composition of alternating sky-white and earth colours. They thus engage in a continual back-and-forth between individuality and uniformity, expressive subjectivity and purported objectivity. While Eliasson’s systematic approach to and serial presentation of his subject matter find clear precedents in the photographs of German Bernd and Hilla Becher, there are differences: where the Bechers work in black and white, Eliasson uses the inherently less austere medium of colour photography, and his subject matter welcomes more eccentric topographic anatomies than the Bechers’ industrial series.

    The systematic bent of the photographs bespeaks a wider disposition on Eliasson’s part towards the methods, materials, subject and style of concrete scientific enterprise. As befits a practice- like science- that is driven by research, Eliasson’s fundamental approach to art-making is not declarative but interrogatory and speculative; rather than striking a stance, he is following a mode of inquiry.” (M. Grynsztejn “Attention Universe: The Work of Olafur Eliasson”, from D. Birnbaum, M. Grynsztejn; M. Speaks, Olafur Eliasson, New York, 2002, p. 60).




67

The Fault Series

2001
32 c-prints mounted on foamcore.
Overall: 96 x 128 in. (243.8 x 325.1 cm); Each: 24 x 16 in. (60.9 x 40.6 cm).
This work is from an edition of six.

Estimate
£50,000 - 70,000 ‡♠

Sold for £168,000

Contemporary Art

22 June 2007, 4pm & 5pm
London