Resonance of the Unforeseen
2020. Printed mesh, steel construction. 117,5 x 13,4 m
Resonance of the Unforeseen completely covers the front façade of the Yokohama Museum of Art. The structure comes alive at the slightest breeze. From a distance, it is almost as if the solid structure of the museum building disappears—turning it into a gigantic public secret. As a visitor approaches, an incredibly subtle moiré effect takes hold. Moreover, it resolves into a line drawing in air, and then, a glorious after-image. Ivana Franke’s work is ambitiously public in terms of scale and presence. But the intimate game it plays with light and line renders near invisibility, paradoxically making it unforgettable. —Raqs Media Collective, curators of the Yokohama Triennale 2020[1]
Masked commuters emerging blinking from quarantine and into Yokohama’s bayside district might think that the Museum of Art has disappeared. In place of its 180-metre-wide modernist façade is a dark, striated screen that—in fitting with the subtitle of the seventh edition of the Yokohama Triennale—resembles an analogue television screen patterned with the white noise caused by cosmic radiation from the “afterglow” of the Big Bang. Closer inspection reveals the source of this illusion: mesh drapes, patterned with vertical black-and-white stripes, have been suspended across the front of the building. This optical intervention by Ivana Franke, titled Resonance of the Unforeseen (2020), anticipates the haunting ways in which themes such as “luminous care” and “toxic glow” radiate through the exhibition.[2]
Project development and realization with Alexandre Mballa-Ekobena, Israel Lopez. Yokohama Museum of Art: Junko Uchiyama, Aki Hoashi.
Commisioned by Yokohama Triennale 2020. Photos: Kato Ken. Photo courtesy Yokohama Triennale
7th Yokohama Triennale, “Afterglow” by Koichiro Osaka, Art Agenda [2] The Best Public Art of 2020. [1]