28 | New Scientist | 13 July 2019
Exhibition
Olafur Eliasson:
In real life
runs from 11 July to
5 January at Tate Modern
in LondonSIXTEEN years ago, Danish-
Icelandic artist Olafur Eliasson
caught London off guard with a
massive indoor artwork. Some
2 million people visited The
Weather Project at the Tate
Modern gallery to bask in the glow
of a giant, artificial sun. It was a
rare moment of collective awe –
created using the simplest of
materials. This week, Eliasson is
back with a major retrospective
exhibition and most of the pieces
are new to the UK. But a lot has
changed since 2003. Days before
his new show opens, we asked the
artist about selfie culture, what
accessible art looks like in the
teched-up Anthropocene, and the
hefty carbon footprint that pictures
and installations leave behind.Do big art and big science have
to justify themselves to people
who don’t get the point?
Sadly, yes, and it’s an argument
we’re losing because great science
and great art are very much
long-term projects, views given to
politicians with short-term goals.
Making a work might take 10
years. Getting it shown might take
another 10. For people to finally
settle down with the experience
might take 10 years, too. It’s a very
slow piece of communication.You command big budgets. Is the
relationship with money tricky
for artists?
To make big projects is expensive.
But think about how much money
an alcohol company throws into
the promotion of some new drink!
I believe there are studies showing
that if you throw a euro or a pound
into the culture sector, it generates
two to three times as much
income. There are more people
working in the culture sector
than there are in the car industry.
It’s also a part of our democratic
stability. It’s a space whereAn artist in the Anthropocene
Olafur Eliasson is returning to London’s Tate Modern after a decade and a half.
Liz Else and Simon Ings asked him how his art has adapted to a globalised worldViews Culture
Wasn’t there a plan to stage
something outside the gallery?
Yes. We’re installing three
waterfalls. We know today there
are no real waterfalls left because
they’re all human-influenced,
if not human-made. So our
waterfalls are as real as anything
in nature – or as unreal.Do you consider yourself an
environmental artist?
In the show, there is a series
of 40 photos of glacial tongues
from Iceland, taken in 1998.
I believed then that culture and
nature were two distinct spaces.
I didn’t fully understand that
the Anthropocene age had started.
When people look at the photos
now, they say “this is about
climate”. When I took them, it
was about their beauty. Soon, I’ll
be retaking those photos from the
same angles, in the same places.
Maybe in October, if I’ve finished,
we will sneak in the new pictures
so we have the two series hanging
next to each other, 20 years apart.In December, you brought
30 polar ice blocks from Greenland
to London and let them melt. Why?
Some 235,000 people were
estimated to have been not
just walking by, but at the ice –
sometimes physically hugging it –
and this, I think, made Ice Watch a
clear and robust statement. This is
what the data from the scientists
looks like. This is what a block
of ice 15,000 years old looks like.
And it’s going to be gone in a week.How big is the carbon footprint
of your work?
We worked with a consultancy
called Julie’s Bicycle, which
helps people in the culture sector
calculate their climate footprint.
The London project came to the
equivalent of 52 return flights
from London to Ilulissat inRUNA
M
AYAMØRK
HUBE
R/STUDIOOLAF
URELIASSON^ ©2017
OLAF
URELIASSON“ If we’re going to
re-engineer the systems
of tomorrow, we need
to risk being foolish.
We need to take risks”we feel we can have difficult
conversations. Is that expensive?
No. It’s actually very cheap.What can we expect from the show
at Tate Modern?
We have about 42 works, big
and small. Some are entertaining,
like Your Uncertain Shadow and
Your Blind Passenger, where a
tunnel full of smoke gives you
the experience of being blind.
Of course, instantly your ears get
more active, you touch the wall
and stretch out your hand so as
not to bump into somebody. Other
works are more contemplative.