The Weather Project 2004
April 21, 2011 • Feeling My Age • Comments
Click image for slideshow on Flickr
In March 2004 my wife, two kids and I went to Tate Modern to catch The Weather Project before it closed. The Danish-born artist Olafur Eliasson had used mirrors, light and mist to create a giant amber sun glowing through clouds in the turbine hall. Based on the British obsession with the weather, it involved 300 mirrors on the ceiling and more than 200 lamps behind a semi-circular screen…. the mirrors on the room made the semicircle become a full round glowing sun. It was weird how it made everyone feel and behave. People just lay around in the “sunlight” staring up at themselves reflected in the mirrors above… some people near us actually cracked out a hamper and drinks and had a full-blown picnic right there on the floor of the museum. When we got out food of our own a member of staff materialised from nowhere and told us to put it away. Being unjustly told off felt like being at school again…
[More about the installation: tate.org.uk]
