Tatsuo Miyajima presents 'Time Waterfall' during Art Basel in Hong Kong

18 March 2016

Coinciding with the 2016 edition of Art Basel in Hong Kong, Tatsuo Miyajima will present Time Waterfall, a large-scale public light installation that will be projected onto the façade of the iconic International Commerce Centre (ICC) building in Hong Kong's harbour. Co-commissioned by Art Basel and ICC, Time Waterfall will be screened intermittently every night from 21 – 26 March between 7.20 – 10pm.

Time Waterfall is a new work by Miyajima which aims to convey the eternal luminance of human life, expressing an ethos of 'living in the present'. The work comprises the natural numbers one to nine, which cascade down the face of the building, never reaching zero. The continuous counting down symbolises life, while the zero implied by the extinction of light acts as a metaphor for death. Each digital number will appear in a different size and descend at its own speed, creating a number of layers so that each represents a trajectory of individual lives.

This work continues Miyajima's signature use of light-emitting diode (LED) counters to demonstrate his three fundamental concepts – ‘Keep Changing’; ‘Connect with Everything’; and ‘Continue Forever’. The absence of zero in his works refers to the Buddhist concept of ‘Sunya’, which symbolizes the void or non-existence. The use of numbers, as abstract and conceptual symbols, becomes Miyajima’s universal language, allowing his work to be appreciated and adapted internationally.

Tatsuo will be in conversation with Samson Young on Wednesday 23 March from 12 –1pm as part of the fair's 'Conversations' programme.

For more information, please visit www.artbasel.com/hong-kong.