The Way of the Sea, Transcending Space - Colors of Life

teamLab, 2018, Interactive Digital Installation, Endless, Sound: Hideaki Takahashi

The Way of the Sea, Transcending Space - Colors of Life

teamLab, 2018, Interactive Digital Installation, Endless, Sound: Hideaki Takahashi

This work starts when the shoal of fish from The Way of the Sea enters the Small Universe in the Cave. the The work ends when the fish leaves the space and disappears.

If you stand at position close to the entrance the boundary between the wall and the floor disappears, the real space dissolves and the lines drawn by the trails of  the crows appear to be drawn in three dimensions in the space. Eventually the body becomes immersed in the artwork world, and the border between the artwork and the viewer dissolves.

The school of fish illuminated by the light move freely through the space, and their trails of light become spatial calligraphy. The fish sense people in the space and try to avoid colliding with them. People are also assigned a color, and when a fish passes by a person they take on that color.

“The Way of the bird” is a saying in Zen which refers to the fact that unlike a human road the road of the bird is not fixed. Its meaning is freedom and of leaving no trace. Here the birds are replaced with fish.

The movement of thousands or tens of thousands of fish is beautiful and mysterious, like a single giant life form. The school of fish has neither a leader nor mutual consensus, but just moves on the simple basis of; if my neighbor moves, then I move, too. However, the biological mechanism that causes hundreds of fish to move at the same time is still enigmatic. It seems there is a universal principle that human beings do not yet understand. The group of trails of light drawn in the space have no meaning as a whole, while being influenced by the existence of people, the lines are drawn by the movement of each fish that seems to obey some kind of primitive rule.

The work is rendered in real time by a computer program, it is neither a prerecorded animation nor imagery on loop.The work as a whole is in constant change; previous states will never be repeated and can never be seen again.