ART: James Turrell, to seek the light,

To seek light is one of the most primal behaviors of all organisms. How moving to see a field of sunflower heads pivot to parallel the their faces to the sun's face across the sunlit day time. They know. They do not turn from true light, and their wisdom is that of eternal verities. 

Light and Word are closely related in the elegant first gospel of John, one of the most clear and profound explanations of grace ever written: "...in Him was life", but it could so easily be conflated to read "in Him was Light",..."the true Light that lighteth every man." 

We love light, cheap and substantive daily commerce with the Eternal: sunrises, moonshine pathways on the water, rainbows, the first evening star.

 No wonder artists, as foolish as moths, have tried to capture light, seeking to make their works reflective and resplendent as the impossibly splendid world around them.  

Notre Dame de Paris

Until cinematography and modern film, that achievement for me was Claude Monet's. His paintings still remain enigmatically perfect, glowing, fresh, as close to light capture as memory could wish.   

Grainstacks at the End of Summer, Evening Effect

1891

Terence Malick, Days of Heaven film still

Then there is the issue of abstract purity of light, a Biblical fantasy, a seeking of the birth experience, I think, the promise of the long life given to the newborn child. With modern projection technology, artists could seek to make this.

A few weeks ago I was in Houston, meditating on light at the Rothko Chapel and in James Turrell's tunnel at at the Museum of Fine Arts.  Then Belize and the diffused deep lapis tones of The Blue Hole. Now there is James Turrell at LACMA, with selected artworks (I wanted more) and careful how-he-built-them documentation.

Afrum (White) 1966 (personal photo)

 A dark room, and the corner has a suspended glowing geometrical presence.

Juke Green (projection) (personal photo)

I found my steps slowing tentatively as I moved into each space. My vision, not to be trusted to verify the volume, yielded to a doubting Thomas hand gesture, thrust into the light field. Even then, the form remained undefined, truly mysterious.

Raemar Pink White, 1969 (web photo)

This room was delightful to be in; I actually felt happier. The pink glow spilled into the hallway, beckoning.

Other pieces yielded pleasantly disorienting, exploratory somatic pleasures of entering dark rooms, shifting subtle colors of opalescent sheen and deep sapphire. A room of small holograms thrust geometric color shapes out from the picture plane, fascinating as the mind kept saying, impossible, there's nothing there; but remained dependably re-appearing exquisite color ghosts.

Turrell designs skyscape architectural spaces within which a perceptual color experience awaits. Dozens have been built across the world. The pristine white models of them set me yearning to enter each of them.

In July I have a reservation to view Light Reignfall, an  perceptual cell color experience. One lies down and is trundled into a 50's looking gadgety personal observatory, rather like an MRI for the soul, or a reverse sensory deprivation chamber.

perceptual cell structure Light Reinfall

Roden Crater, a 400,000 year-old extinct volcano in Arizona, will be Turrell's lasting celebration of the 1960's vision of personal liberation.  Within the geological structure he has built various cells and apertures for viewing that frame perceptual experiences of the sky and light.

   

I was about to get in the car and start driving until I learned that it's not finished.  

The exhibit includes scale models, architectural and design drawings, and these are lavish in detail, revealing the technical scope of Turrell's oeuvre.  

On June 21 a Turrell Guggenheim exhibit opens, which will probably be spectacular.  He will transform the singular volumes of the museum interior with light.  

rendering

What I wished: that I could be alone and meditate during a cycle of an artwork. LACMA had a controlled member admission schedule to admit only a few each time, which made for an open, flowing experience. 

I also wished for a walk-through tunnel like Houston MFA has. A lighted tunnel traverse is a powerful metaphor for life's journey, and was a memory of a lifetime for me.

Houston Museum of Fine Arts  (personal photo)

Besides the metaphors of light to insight, growth, and grace that come to mind, another powerful idea is return to the center, the womb, and interiority.  This light is not the light of nature and outdoors, it is within.

It is also subtly disturbing; the colors have no warmth.  Even orange and yellow seem cool. The seductive experience is honest artifice.  It seems airless, cold, like being in a beautiful refrigerator, or like hearing the strange vibrations of electronic music. One senses the presence of the machine.

The act of looking at light engages somatic and sensory perception in a unique way that returns one to oneself, engaged with observing and dissolving boundaries. 

Turrell is not grave, as is the Rothko Chapel, which led to somber introspection. The reaction engenders wonder which prompts spontaneous exchanges of delight and discovery between viewers, and left me marveling and full of wonder, light of spirit because light had been shone to me.