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Carsten Höller’s The Double Club Los Angeles, Luna Luna, Los Angeles, March 7–10, 2024. Artwork © Carsten Höller

Installation

Carsten Höller
The Double Club Los Angeles

March 7–10, 2024
Luna Luna, Los Angeles
lunaluna.com

Carsten Höller’s The Double Club Los Angeles transforms a vast warehouse in the heart of the Los Angeles Arts District, used by the Luna Luna team to unpack and reconstruct the rides on display in its restaging of the art amusement park, into a fanciful landscape. Now in its third incarnation, Höller’s installation begins with a single floor area and applies the mathematical rule of division by halving the footprint, while doubling it in height, to create nine unique spaces that deconstruct the carnival experience. The four-day event is presented by Prada Mode, in partnership with Luna Luna, and includes musical programming curated by the rapper Drake, who played a major role in bringing Luna Luna to LA, and Höller, who visited the park during its 1987 debut in Hamburg, Germany. The event is free and open to the public on March 9–10 with admission to Luna Luna.

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Carsten Höller’s The Double Club Los Angeles, Luna Luna, Los Angeles, March 7–10, 2024. Artwork © Carsten Höller

Carsten Höller, Decimal Clock (Blue and Orange), 2023 © Carsten Höller. Photo: Thomas Lannes

Visit

Noor Riyadh Festival 2023
The Bright Side of the Desert Moon

November 30–December 16, 2023
Various locations in Riyadh
riyadhart.sa

The third annual Noor Riyadh, a citywide festival of public art installations, will showcase expansive light-based artworks by more than one hundred artists across five pivotal city hubs. Titled The Bright Side of the Desert Moon, the selection features ephemeral sculptures, urban projections, and immersive site-specific installations, including neon works by Douglas Gordon and Carsten Höller

Carsten Höller, Decimal Clock (Blue and Orange), 2023 © Carsten Höller. Photo: Thomas Lannes

Carsten Höller, Abu Dhabi Dots, 2023 © Carsten Höller. Photo: Colin Robertson

Public Installation

Carsten Höller
Abu Dhabi Dots

November 18, 2023–January 30, 2024, 5:30pm–1am daily
Corniche, Abu Dhabi
abudhabiculture.ae

Carsten Höller’s Abu Dhabi Dots (2023) is installed on the waterfront in Abu Dhabi as part of the inaugural edition of Manar Abu Dhabi, a festival offering an immersive, multisensory experience to celebrate the natural beauty of the United Arab Emirates. The second installment of the artist’s Dots series, the public light exhibit, which begins each evening at 5:30pm, comprises twenty spotlights in four colors that follow participants’ movements and allow them to play a “reward and punishment” game with one another.

Carsten Höller, Abu Dhabi Dots, 2023 © Carsten Höller. Photo: Colin Robertson

Carsten Höller’s Light Wall (Outdoor Version), 2021, installation view, King Abdulaziz Historical Center, Riyadh © Carsten Höller. Photo: © Riyadh Art

Installation

Carsten Höller
Light Wall (Outdoor Version)

March 18–April 3, 2021

Carsten Höller’s Light Wall has been installed in Riyadh as part of Noor Riyadh, a new annual citywide festival of public art installations. The theme for 2021 is Under One Sky, which alludes to the universal human impulse to gather around light, to look into the flames of a campfire, and to gaze at the stars. While the theme in its English translation is instantly relatable to an international audience, the words in Arabic literally mean “we gather under one sky”—an idea of togetherness that becomes particularly resonant in light of the global pandemic.

Carsten Höller’s Light Wall (Outdoor Version), 2021, installation view, King Abdulaziz Historical Center, Riyadh © Carsten Höller. Photo: © Riyadh Art

Adam McEwen, Escape from New York, 2014 (still from “Battery Tunnel”) © Adam McEwen

Exhibition

Broadcast
Alternate Meanings in Film and Video

You’re only as young as the last time you changed your mind.
—Timothy Leary

Gagosian is pleased to present Broadcast: Alternate Meanings in Film and Video, an online exhibition of artists’ films and videos viewable exclusively on gagosian.com. The exhibition will be organized into a series of “chapters,” each lasting two weeks. The first chapter begins on Tuesday, May 19, 2020.

Broadcast: Alternate Meanings in Film and Video employs the innate immediacy of time-based art to spark reflection on the here and now, taking the words of famed psychologist and countercultural icon Timothy Leary as its starting point. 

Adam McEwen, Escape from New York, 2014 (still from “Battery Tunnel”) © Adam McEwen

Carsten Höller, Fara Fara, 2014 (still) © Carsten Höller

Screening

Carsten Höller
Fara Fara

Monday, December 30, 2019
Palm Beach, Kinshasa, Democratic Republic of Congo

Realized together with the Swedish film director Måns Månsson, Carsten Höller’s film Fara Fara (2014) documents the music scene in Kinshasa, the capital of the Democratic Republic of Congo. In Congolese tradition, the fara fara, which means “face-to-face” in Lingala, is a musical competition in which two musicians perform concurrently on different stages, playing for as long as they possibly can. The musician who is able to engage their audience the longest wins. The film examines the individual psychology of the people who spearhead Kinshasa’s music scene, offering insightful observations on the context, history, and political impact of this specific subculture.

Carsten Höller, Fara Fara, 2014 (still) © Carsten Höller

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Announcements

Carsten Höller inside Brutalisten, Stockholm, 2022. Photo: Pierre Björk

Launch

Carsten Höller
Brutalisten Restaurant

On May 3, 2022, Carsten Höller will launch Brutalisten, a new restaurant concept in Stockholm and the latest embodiment of his long-term culinary and artistic project labeled the Brutalist Kitchen. The 28-seat restaurant will adhere to Höller’s “Brutalist Kitchen Manifesto,” a set of rules created in loose reference to Brutalist architecture, which is characterized by an emphasis on bare building materials over decorative design. The menu is classified in three sections: “Semi-Brutalist” dishes (using oil or minimal ingredients), “Brutalist” dishes (using salt and water), and “Orthodox-Brutalist” dishes (no additional ingredients).

Carsten Höller inside Brutalisten, Stockholm, 2022. Photo: Pierre Björk

Carsten Höller, Seven Sliding Doors Corridor (Outdoor Version), 2021, installation view, Luma Arles, France © Carsten Höller. Photo: Adrian Deweerdt

Permanent Installation

Carsten Höller
Seven Sliding Doors Corridor (Outdoor Version)

Carsten Höller’s installation Seven Sliding Doors Corridor (Outdoor Version), recently installed at Luma Arles, France, consists of electronic sliding doors with mirrored surfaces on both sides, through which a viewer can walk in an apparently endless passage. The doors are installed inside a corridor that traverses a pond in a garden. Motion sensors cause them to slide open when someone approaches and close when the person moves away. As a result, the movements of viewers alternately break and bind the visual limits of the space, which can be entered from either end of the corridor, increasing the likelihood of unexpected encounters.

Carsten Höller, Seven Sliding Doors Corridor (Outdoor Version), 2021, installation view, Luma Arles, France © Carsten Höller. Photo: Adrian Deweerdt

Carsten Höller, Isometric Slides, 2021 (detail), installation view, The Tower, Luma Arles, France © Carsten Höller. Photo: Mark Domage

Permanent Installation

Carsten Höller
Isometric Slides

Carsten Höller has developed a site-specific slide for the Tower at Luma Arles, France, designed by Frank Gehry. According to Höller, “a slide is a sculpture that you can travel inside” and experience a unique emotional state situated between pleasure and madness. However, the artist emphasizes that it is not necessary to use the slide to make sense of it—observing other visitors travel between levels of the building is an equally stimulating experience.

Carsten Höller, Isometric Slides, 2021 (detail), installation view, The Tower, Luma Arles, France © Carsten Höller. Photo: Mark Domage

Carsten Höller, DAC Slide, 2020 (detail), installation view, Danish Architecture Center, Copenhagen © Carsten Höller. Photo: courtesy the artist and Ny Carlsbergfondet

Permanent Installation

Carsten Höller
DAC Slide

Carsten Höller has developed a site-specific 40-meter slide for the Danish Architecture Center, Copenhagen. The spiral slide takes visitors from the Exhibition Forum four stories down to the ground floor. Of these playful structures Höller says, “Why are slides not used in architecture, to complement stairs, elevators, and escalators?” DAC Slide was donated by the Ny Carlsbergfondet.

Carsten Höller, DAC Slide, 2020 (detail), installation view, Danish Architecture Center, Copenhagen © Carsten Höller. Photo: courtesy the artist and Ny Carlsbergfondet

View with Carsten Höller’s augmented reality software Through (2019), which takes viewers through a portal into a world with no perspective

New Release

Infinite Canvas
A Film by Ryan McGinley featuring Carsten Höller

Last year, seven artists, including Carsten Höller, led an augmented reality (AR) project in Apple Stores around the world. In collaboration with Apple and the New Museum, this project became [AR]T, a series of interactive AR installations. A new documentary directed by Ryan McGinley, available to watch on Apple TV, highlights the work of each artist and chronicles how they pushed the boundaries of their work to explore the uncharted territory of augmented reality art.

View with Carsten Höller’s augmented reality software Through (2019), which takes viewers through a portal into a world with no perspective

Artwork © Carsten Höller. Photo: Laurin Schmid

Installation

Carsten Höller
Bonner Slide

Opened May 31, 2018
Bundeskunsthalle, Bonn, Germany
www.bundeskunsthalle.de

Carsten Höller has developed a site-specific slide connecting the roof of the Bundeskunsthalle to the museum’s grounds. Bonner Slide (2018) aims to create a symbiotic relationship with the museum’s architecture. The slide has been inaugurated as part of the exhibition The Playground Project—Outdoor, but will remain in place for several years to be enjoyed during the outdoor season.

Artwork © Carsten Höller. Photo: Laurin Schmid

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Museum Exhibitions

Rachel Feinstein, Mr. Time, 2015 © Rachel Feinstein

On View

Fairy Tales

Through April 28, 2024
Queensland Art Gallery and Gallery of Modern Art, Brisbane, Australia
www.qagoma.qld.gov.au

Fairy Tales explores centuries of beloved folk stories through contemporary art, costumes, immersive installations, and cinema from visual storytellers around the world. The exhibition aims to untangle themes of bravery and justice, loyalty and humility, cunning and aspiration. Work by Rachel Feinstein, Urs Fischer, and Carsten Höller is included.

Rachel Feinstein, Mr. Time, 2015 © Rachel Feinstein

Tatiana Trouvé, Les indéfinis, 2018 © Tatiana Trouvé

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What a Wonderful World

May 26, 2022–May 21, 2023
Museo nazionale delle arti del XXI secolo, Rome
www.maxxi.art

This exhibition brings together major installations by fourteen international artists including key works from the museum’s collection and others commissioned for the occasion. The works on display investigate issues of scientific and technological progress relating to the challenges of the contemporary era. Work by Carsten Höller and Tatiana Trouvé is included.

Tatiana Trouvé, Les indéfinis, 2018 © Tatiana Trouvé

Carsten Höller, Divisions (Turquoise Lines and Pink Circles), 2014 © Carsten Höller

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Carsten Höller
Day

October 5, 2021–February 28, 2022
Museu de Arte, Arquitetura e Tecnologia, Lisbon
www.maat.pt

Carsten Höller: Day brings together an array of works producing light and darkness, including sculptures that function as lamps, projections, and architectural interventions, dating from 1987, when Höller was working as a scientist, to today. More than twenty works, many re-created especially for this show, unfold across the museum in an arrangement that creates a dialogue with its architecture. The exhibition space is illuminated exclusively by Höller’s art, leading audiences through multisensory experiences of altered perception.

Carsten Höller, Divisions (Turquoise Lines and Pink Circles), 2014 © Carsten Höller

Installation view, Dyr i kunsten, Arken Museum, Ishoj, Denmark, May 26, 2020–January 10, 2021. Artwork © Damien Hirst and Science Ltd. All rights reserved, DACS 2020. Photo: David Stjernholm

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Dyr i kunsten

March 21, 2020–January 10, 2021
Arken Museum, Ishoj, Denmark
uk.arken.dk

Dyr i kunsten, or Animals in Art, features sculpture, installations, video, photography, and paintings by a wide array of international artists whose work explores the ways that humans study, categorize, live with, and use animals and how we thus attempt to gain a deeper understanding of ourselves. Work by Douglas Gordon, Damien Hirst, and Carsten Höller is included.

Installation view, Dyr i kunsten, Arken Museum, Ishoj, Denmark, May 26, 2020–January 10, 2021. Artwork © Damien Hirst and Science Ltd. All rights reserved, DACS 2020. Photo: David Stjernholm

Carsten Höller, Gartenkinder, 2014 © Carsten Höller. Photo: Mike Bruce

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Carsten Höller
Reproduction

September 28, 2019–April 13, 2020
Copenhagen Contemporary
copenhagencontemporary.org

In this exhibition Carsten Höller examines the theme of reproduction, adopting an approach that is at once scientific and artistic. The museum is transformed into a large, biology-based playscape where, for example, the visitors are encouraged to crawl through the pips of a die, and where slow-moving merry-go-rounds and corridors of mirrors affect their sensory perceptions.

Carsten Höller, Gartenkinder, 2014 © Carsten Höller. Photo: Mike Bruce

Carsten Höller, Upside-Down Goggles, 1994– © Carsten Höller. Photo: Elzbieta Bialkowska

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Carsten Höller
Behaviour

September 26, 2019–February 23, 2020
Kunsten Museum of Modern Art Aalborg, Denmark
kunsten.dk

Carsten Höller’s work aims to involve its viewers both physically and mentally, often arriving at an intersection between play, science, and art. In Behaviour, visitors experience contact with artwork that enables disruption or transformation of the way they view their surroundings via light, sound, smell, mirror images, and other means.

Carsten Höller, Upside-Down Goggles, 1994– © Carsten Höller. Photo: Elzbieta Bialkowska

Carsten Höller, Dice (Limestone), 2019 (in progress) © Carsten Höller. Photo: Ricardo Gonçalves

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Carsten Höller in
Expanded

May 10–November 24, 2019
Fondazione Giorgio Cini, Venice
www.primeirapedra.com

Expanded features three newly commissioned works in stone by Marina Abramović, Carsten Höller, and Julião Sarmento. Höller presents a large-scale die made of Portuguese limestone based on his 2014 sculpture Dice (White Body, Black Dots). The exhibition is part of Primeira Pedra (First Stone), an experimental international research program that explores the potential of Portuguese stone. The project is managed by experimentadesign and cofunded by the EU.

Carsten Höller, Dice (Limestone), 2019 (in progress) © Carsten Höller. Photo: Ricardo Gonçalves

Carsten Höller, Two Roaming Beds (Grey), 2015 © Carsten Höller

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Carsten Höller
Sunday

March 29–June 30, 2019
Museo Tamayo, Mexico City
museotamayo.org

For his premier solo show in Central America, Carsten Höller is presenting a number of new playful and experimental installations, as well as some of his better-known works. Visitors are invited to stay overnight and roam the exhibition space in one of the artist’s robotic twin beds Two Roaming Beds (Grey) (2015).

Carsten Höller, Two Roaming Beds (Grey), 2015 © Carsten Höller

Carsten Höller, Light Wall, 2000/17 © Carsten Höller

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Ecstasy

September 29, 2018–February 24, 2019
Kunstmuseum Stuttgart, Germany
kunstmuseum-stuttgart.de

This exhibition allows the visitor to become familiar with the various faces of ecstasy and with the shifting social significance of mind-altering states as it changed over the centuries. In doing so, it also considers how different cultural spheres handle the phenomenon of ecstasy. With art at its foundation, the show introduces viewers to various ways that artists have approached ecstatic states—including pictorial representations, video, installation works, and kinesthetic experiences. Work by Andreas Gursky, Carsten Höller, and Man Ray is included.

Carsten Höller, Light Wall, 2000/17 © Carsten Höller

Alexander Calder, Untitled, 1963 © 2018 Calder Foundation, New York/Artists Rights Society (ARS), New York

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Action<–>Reaction
100 Years of Kinetic Art

September 22, 2018–January 20, 2019
Kunsthal Rotterdam, Netherlands
www.kunsthal.nl

Action<–>Reaction: 100 Years of Kinetic Art covers a wide range of kinetic art and offers visitors an opportunity to experience work that appeals to all of the senses. The exhibition is a revival of the successful 2013 Paris exhibition Dynamo. Work by Alexander Calder, Marcel Duchamp, and Carsten Höller is included.

Alexander Calder, Untitled, 1963 © 2018 Calder Foundation, New York/Artists Rights Society (ARS), New York

Carsten Höller, Smelling Tree (Portrait of Cedric Price), 2014 © Carsten Höller. Photo: Ivo Pisanti

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Carsten Höller in
Urban Forest

October 26, 2018–January 20, 2019
Riso Museum, Palermo, Sicily
www.poloartecontemporanea.it

Artists and works of art from different geographical areas shape a contemporary “forest” where a combination of nature and culture is investigated. Work by Carsten Höller is included.

Carsten Höller, Smelling Tree (Portrait of Cedric Price), 2014 © Carsten Höller. Photo: Ivo Pisanti

Carsten Höller, rendering of The Florence Experiment Slides, 2018

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Carsten Höller and Stefano Mancuso
The Florence Experiment

April 19–August 26, 2018
Fondazione Palazzo Strozzi, Florence, Italy
www.palazzostrozzi.org

Carsten Höller and plant neurobiologist Stefano Mancuso are collaborating on The Florence Experiment, which enables the pair to study the interaction between human beings and plants. Visitors may participate in two very different experiments, the first entailing a descent down a sixty-five-foot slide and the second involving carefully curated screenings in two special cinemas. The feelings of excitement, surprise, amusement, and fear experienced by the participants will be compared with the growth and reactions of various kinds of plants in order to study the empathy between plant organisms and human beings.

Carsten Höller, rendering of The Florence Experiment Slides, 2018

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