When I first touch my eye onto Region No. 43701-No. 43900 by Miyajima Tatsuo in the exhibition “Shanshui: Echoes and Signals” in M+ Museum, I was totally perplexed by the art form. If being asked my first impression and direct response, it would be the pain in my eyes from looking at red, bright LED lights in a dark exhibition room. The name also confused me, and I am still puzzled. Please comment or email me if any ideas come to you!
Created in 1998, Miyajima used 200 LEDs mounted on black aluminum boards with flashing numbers between 1 and 99 in red and green in endless loops. They are arranged in 20 columns, and every seventh counter flashes green.
At a glance, the artwork is not aesthetic and even meaningless. However, stop your hasty steps and stand in front of the installation. The endlessly loop represents the Buddhist concept of samsara – the cycle of reincarnation, death, and rebirth. Looking at it closely, you would discover that the artist omits all zeros, a number that symbolizes emptiness and finality for the artist. The work suggests that existence is an endless cycle rather than a linear progression towards a final end. Miyajima evokes a sense of the perpetual continuation of life energy.
The use of LED lights and computer-like counting is a direct representation of the technological and industrial aspects of modern society. Yet Miyajima aims to infuse this technical medium with spiritual meaning, condensing concepts of reincarnation and the cycle of life into simple numerical sequences. This juxtaposes the rational and technological with the mystical, perhaps commenting on humanity’s need to find deeper meaning amidst our technological reality. Looking at a seemingly random board of emotionless codes and trying to see through it to get some inspiration, that’s also what I am doing!
After being informed that the artist spent most of his childhood in hospitals as a chronically ill child, the work gave me another perspective and sparked new flames of inspiration. Don’t the flashing numbers look like the precious momentary glimpses we get of existence? The cycling evokes how life continues perpetually replacing what is lost. The regularity of the counts amidst the changing lights hints at the ordering principals that govern the chaos of life and death.
What is the significance of 7? Or maybe the pattern itself is a message? Or maybe Miyajima tries to convey that despite attempts to quantify human experience into data streams, something complex and unique always resists full reduction into pure code?
