Visual artist Ryoji Ikeda exhibits at Eye Film Museum

At this very moment the works of Ryoji Ikeda, a visual artist and a key figure in the world of electronic music, can be seen and heard in an exhibition at Eye in Amsterdam. Expect a spectacular presentation that will immerse you in images and sound.

In creating his minimalist and breathtaking art, Ikeda (born in Japan in 1966) draws on mathematical concepts, quantum mechanics, data, sound and light, transforming them into works of intangible power and beauty, often capturing the invisible structures and data that shape our lives.

With mathematical precision, he reduces sound and images to their essence in stunning installations that bombard viewers with visual data. From pixels to the universe, he brings together the very smallest and very biggest in his work.

What can be seen in this exhibition?

Among the works on show at Eye is the radar [3WUXGA version A], (2012/2018). In this huge projection, sublime abstract compositions alternate with images from a microscope and a telescope, pictures of faraway places, and maps of moons and weather charts. data.scan (2009) translates data from scientific studies that map both the human body and the astronomic universe.

point of no return (2018) is a new work made by Ikeda for Eye. It shows a black hole containing huge quantities of information, while the wall behind shows a very bright white hole. Ikeda: “Technically simple, but this new piece will be my most metaphysical work.”

Ikeda is also presenting 4’33” (2010), a tribute to the composition 4’33” by John Cage and an elegant depiction of Cage’s philosophical meditation on the impossibility of silence.

data.tron [3 SXGA+ version] (2009-2018) is presented on a giant screen on which you can experience the vastness of the universe in the endless space between 0 and 1. How many dots are there in a line? How many numbers are there?

Live performance

Ryoji Ikeda will give a live performance on 23 November. This performance is in collaboration with Amsterdam Art Weekend and IDFA. In his live performance C⁴I, Ikeda deals with the ways in which data form our understanding of the world. The hypnotic work meanders between nature, science and philosophy and subtly crosses the boundaries between the real and the virtual.