A sparkling river in the sky, luminous forms with a life of their own, playful distortions of light dancing to electronic music in dark rooms – this is the world of Dark Matter, an audiovisual exhibition that aims to keep its visitors away from the outside world and in their senses.
The mastermind behind this multidimensional experience is light artist Christopher Bauder and his design studio WHITEvoid who also brought us DEEP WEB and SKALAR at Kraftwerk Berlin. In 2014, Bauder and WHITEvoid also marked the 25th anniversary of the fall of the Berlin Wall with LICHTGRENZE where they presented 8,000 luminescent balloons across the city where the wall once stood.
Bauder describes Dark Matter as a sort of historic exhibition of the studio’s creations over the years, with seven installations dating from 20 years ago and as recently as this year.
The installations are divided into seven unique rooms that follow a scenario through black industrial halls, each room becoming more immersive and interactive than the last.
“The first three rooms, I always imagine them as a zoo of electronic audiovisual artwork,” Bauder said. “And over time you have more possibilities to also interact with the pieces and be a part of the art… so it’s also an emotional journey where we try to load you with different experiences.”
One of these interactive pieces is the TONE SCALE where visitors can touch a rung of the ladder and trigger various sounds, as well as an associated light animation, and possibly collaborate with other visitors to create their own audiovisual concert.
Another notable installation is REVERSE, which will premiere at Dark Matter and features music by Boris Acket. Bauder explains that while his other light installations normally work with a dark background in an attempt to create shapes with light, INVERSE does the opposite with an illuminated white background and black objects, creating a mysterious, mysterious ghostly figure.
Bauder hopes Dark Matter will elicit the same feelings in visitors as his love of techno. Growing up in Berlin clubs, he has always been interested in the combination of light and music and how these elements can manipulate people’s emotions and energy.
“The way I felt loaded going to a techno party or a rave,” Bauder explained. “Where you don’t know when one sound ends and another begins… and it works on your body, it works on your emotional state. And that was something that I wanted to integrate into the context of the traditional art exhibition. This is where it all came from.
The exhibition will end with GRID, an incredible kinetic light installation associated with the music of Robert Henke that can be enjoyed from any perspective thanks to the room-engulfing HOLOPLOT 3D sound system, which is just one example of innovative cutting-edge technology presented in the exhibition.
Dark Matter is sure to be an awesome otherworldly escape from our lockdown issues that you won’t want to miss. Due to lockdown restrictions, it’s unclear exactly when Dark Matter will open, but you can subscribe to the studio’s newsletter. here be informed of the pre-sale of tickets.
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