The city of London, England has been a witness to some rather amazing artistic structures. And thanks to a new proposed project, there will soon be another structure that looks to add another example in a totally tubular fashion.
A new exhibit by Belgian artist Carsten Hoeller, Decisions, will be at the Hayward Gallery which is located at the Southbank Centre. Hoeller’s exhibit will be a source of great interest due in part to the presence of two massive slides as the centerpiece. These slides will take up residence on one full side of the building, originating from the rooftop adorned with glass pyramids and ending in a public plaza outside. The installation, entitled Isometric Slides, made an appearance in the United Kingdom in 2006 in another exhibit organized by the Tate Modern gallery. Hoeller’s giant slides will complement some of his other works which also clock in with immense specifications.
One example is the Pill Clock installation, which is comprised of a clock that’s ensconced within the ceiling that drops a million pills on the ground in front of a drinking fountain. Visitors are then asked to take a pill, without having any knowledge of what it will do. The giant slides represent a part of Hoeller’s work that has arguably been his signature medium since the first slide installation he displayed in 1998. The slides have undergone various iterations since then, with the most recent being in the New Museum of New York City in 2012. That slide let visitors enter on the fourth floor and exit on the second, and was placed entirely within the building’s interior. The Isometric Slides experience is designed to give people a co-mingled sense of freedom, vertigo, loss and wonder.
Other exhibits within Decisions will also include Flying Machines, an installation that will take up space on a roof terrace of the gallery building and is set to give visitors the experience of flight above the city skyline. For those travelers who may happen to be across the pond, Decisions will run from June 10th until September 6th. More information can be found at the gallery’s website.
