Carsten Nicolai – Unidisplay

CarstenNicolai_Unidisplay

Gestalten, ISBN-13: 978-3899554861, English, 80 pages, 2013, UK

Nicolai’s science-oriented artworks have some unique characteristics including a polarised shifting between complexity and simplicity that always deeply involves our senses. It is not by accident that his intellectual proximity to long time professional partner Ryoji Ikeda has been prominent, especially in the works where they encapsulate audiences in enclosed spaces filled with high contrast visuals, challenging their perception in compelling ways. His installations often investigate human perception and awareness of time, space and language at large. This book is a sort of catalogue of his “unidisplay”, a landmark artwork. It consists of a dark room where spectators are confronted with a fourteen-meter projection and all sorts of perceptual challenges (like after-images and complementary colours). Interested in inducing alterations to consciousness, unidisplay embodies Nicolai’s extremely dynamic digital audio-visuality. This catalogue dissects the layers and the various elements composing the work, becoming a post-libretto, unfolding the fields of knowledge involved (science, perception, architecture, art, video and sound) in a revealing and reflective manner. The reproduction of patterns in print and the unveiling of some of the mechanisms (like the visualization of time measurement units) guides the reader through the meanderings of the work, never compromising the visual consistency or the aura that Nicolai’s works generate. Alessandro Ludovico

Carsten Nicolai – Unidisplay