The Vinyl Factory has announced the European premiere of unicolour, a new work by Carsten Nicolai examining the psychology of colour perception. Submerged in panoramic wavelengths of blue, red, green and grey that grow, evaporate and meld into one another, the viewer is confronted with an infinite, visceral expanse of colour and sound.
Unicolour is a development of Nicolai’s previous projects univrs/uniscope version (2010) and unidisplay (2012), and is informed by Goethe’s Theory of Colours, the works of artists Josef Albers and Johannes Itten and historic scientific and semiotic writings that reflect on the connections between psychology and coloration. Unfolding against a long wall, and using mirrors to vastly expand the effect, unicolor utilises a series of 24 modules to stimulate different visual effects that interfere with perception and seeing.
Carsten Nicolai’s practice investigates the boundaries between visual and audio art forms within an integrated artistic approach. Influenced by scientific reference systems, Nicolai often engages mathematical patterns such as grids and codes, as well as error, randomisation and self-organising structures.
Together with the presentation of Ryoji Ikeda’s supersymmetry (23 April – 31 May), unicolour marks a year of site-specific installations in Brewer Street Car Park in Soho. The Vinyl Factory’s pairing of the artists’ new works continues an association between the two that originated in 1999 when they collaborated on cyclo., a project exploring the visualisation of sound using equipment originally developed for mastering vinyl records. Since then they have worked together researching and expanding the potential of digital technologies in audio-visual art.
Carsten Nicolai and Ryoji Ikeda are the latest artists to collaborate with The Vinyl Factory for their vast new cultural hub in Brewer Street Car Park. They follow installations by practitioners such as Richard Mosse, Conrad Shawcross and Dinos Chapman that reflect The Vinyl Factory’s vision for creating, supporting and showcasing audio-visual art as well as record label releases, and hosting events and performances. The Vinyl Factory recently launched the world’s first mobile record pressing plant, and in February began a major collaboration with White Cube in London on a solo show by Christian Marclay. In the summer, in partnership with the Barbican, The Vinyl Factory stages the only international stop of Station to Station, American multi-media artist Doug Aitken’s wildly celebrated experiment in spontaneous creation.
An extension of his fascination with the boundaries between audio and visual art forms, Carsten Nicolai’s new work will stretch panoramic wavelengths of blue, red, green and grey to infinity, confronting the viewer with a visceral expanse of colour and sound to test the limits of perception.
Developing Nicolai’s previous projects univrs/uniscope version (2010) and unidisplay (2012), unicolour will unfold against a mirrored wall to give the impression of infinity, drawing inspiration from a huge range of influences from Goethe’s Theory Of Colour to the work of artists Josef Albers and Johannes Itten.
Uniciolour will also mark a year of site-specific installations at Brewer Street Car Park, and bring Nicolai back into contact with long time collaborator Ryoji Ikeda, whose installation supersymmetry opens at the space in April. Influenced in equal measure by data, mathematic codes and random or self-organising structures, the pair have spent the last fifteen years researching the potential of digital technologies in audio-visual art.
Carsten Nicolai’s unicolour will run from 23rd June to 2nd August at The Vinyl Factory’s space at Brewer Street Car Park , Brewer Street, London W1F 0LA. Free admission, open Tuesday – Sunday, 12-6pm.