teamLab: Dance! Art Exhibition, Learn & Play! Future Park | teamLab

Flowers bud, bloom, and in the course of time, wither and die. While eternally repeating the process of life and death, the places where they grow change gradually. When people stand still, the flowers surrounding them grow and bloom abundantly, but when people touch the flowers or walk around, they scatter and die all at once.The artwork is not a pre-recorded image that is played back; it continues to be rendered in real time under the influence of people's behavior. The picture at this moment can never be seen again.
In spring in the Kunisaki Peninsula, there are many cherry blossoms in the mountains and canola blossoms at their base. A visit to this region led teamLab to wonder how many of these flowers were planted by people and how many of them were native to the environment. It was a place overflowing with flowers, a place of great serenity and contentment. This nature is an ecosystem influenced by human activity, making us feel that nature and humanity are not in conflict. Perhaps a truly comforting nature is one that encompasses human presence as part of the ecosystem. Based on the premise that nature cannot be completely controlled, this artwork explores human activity that lives closely aligned to the rules of nature.
This artwork is an ecological pictorial space drawn through Ultrasubjective Space, which continues to be generated along with the body, others, time, and the environment. Viewers physically walk around and touch inside the world of the artwork, transforming it together with others in the same space.
This pictorial space differs from images or paintings flattened by a lens or single-point perspective. In such images or paintings, space appears behind the picture plane; the space that opens there and the space the viewer inhabits are split, and the picture plane becomes a boundary surface. The viewpoint is fixed at a single point, and bodily freedom is lost.On the other hand, a picture plane formed by Ultrasubjective Space is not a boundary that separates where we are from the world of the artwork. The world of the artwork is not outside a window; it appears as a single field that is continuously connected, without boundary, to the space in which the viewer’s body exists. Moreover, any position — front, back, left, or right — can become a viewpoint, so viewpoints exist in infinite number, and the viewer is physically free to move.Not bound to a single point, the viewer moves their body and lets their eyes roam freely, continually re-composing the world of the artwork as it changes over time, and building the pictorial space within themselves. In that moment, the artwork becomes a centerless, subjective, and embodied pictorial space in which the viewer walks and touches.
In this space, the boundaries between the viewer and the artwork become ambiguous. The artwork transforms simply by the presence of a body there, and the behavior of others also changes the world of the artwork. In conventional art, other people were often considered an obstacle that interferes with a one-on-one relationship with the artwork. However, here, the presence of others enriches and creates new changes in the artwork.
This artwork is an attempt to expand painting from a world on the other side of the screen into a space continuous with the body, others, time, and the environment. The artwork continues to be generated within the relationships among the behavior of people, the life and death of flowers, the passage of time, and the entire space. Here, the painting does not exist on its own as a completed entity; it relates to people's bodies and includes the presence of others, existing as an ecological field without boundaries.

This artwork is in a state of continuous change. Aligned to the passing hours of the day and over a period of one year, a seasonal year of flowers blossom and scatter. Flowers are born, grow and blossom in profusion before the petals scatter and the flowers wither and fade away. The cycle of birth and death repeats itself, continuing for eternity. The artwork is created in two versions: one with “A Whole Year per Hour, Dark” and another with “A Whole Year per Year, Dark”.

All oceans are connected to each other, and so are all the waves in this world.

In classical East Asian art, waves are often expressed using a combination of lines. These waves created by lines allow us to realize that each wave is one part of a larger flow, and conveys life as though the waves are a living entity.

When the waves rise, we can feel a powerful breath of life, as though life is blooming. It feels as though each wave has a life of its own. But when the waves collapse and disappear, we realize, with a sense of fragility, that they were a part of the ocean. And that ocean is connected to all of the other oceans. In other words, all of the waves in the world are connected to each other.
The waves seem alive because life is like a rising wave. It is a miraculous phenomenon that continuously emerges from a single, continuous ocean.

The waves are expressed through a continuous body of countless water particles. The interactions of particles are calculated, and then the movement of water is simulated in three-dimensional space. Lines are created along the trajectories of the water particles, and drawn on the surface layer of the three-dimensional waves.

The lines are created with what teamLab refers to as Ultrasubjective Space. In contrast to space that is created through, or cut out by, lenses and perspective, Ultrasubjective Space does not fix the viewer’s viewpoint and in turn frees the body. The wall that the waves are seen on does not become a boundary between the viewer and the artwork, and the artwork space is continuous with the space of the viewer’s body.

A digital installation in three dimensions on seven screens.

This artwork explores Japanese spatial awareness. It exists in a three-dimensional space that we call ultrasubjective space. The Japanese mythical bird Yatagarasu,* rendered in light, flies around the space leaving trails of light in its path, creating spatial calligraphy. As the crows chase and are chased by one another through the air, they turn into flowers and eventually scatter.

The Itano Circus is a unique technique pioneered by creator animator Ichiro Itano. In this technique, a screen is packed to capacity with swarms of flying missiles that are drawn in a completely distorted perspective. These distortions give the audience a stronger sense of dynamic movement and impact. Through ultra-high-speed camera work and staging that envelops the viewer’s perspective, this technique creates an overwhelmingly beautiful image.

In this digital artwork, an homage to the Itano Circus, teamLab has recreated this distortion of space formerly used in 2-D animation in a 3-D space. This is an exploration of 1) what sort of logical structure of perception constitutes this distortion of space pioneered by Japan’s animators, and 2) the hypothesis that this is in line with the continuous tradition of Japanese spatial perception. By recreating this distortion in a 3-D space, teamLab widens the perspectival viewpoint. This work is also an experiment in visual experience, as it divides the viewer’s perspective while deploying divided perspective into 3-D space.

*Yatagarasu, the three-legged crow, is a creature found in Japanese mythology. It is believed to represent the sun and the will of Heaven.

All the various fish drawn by everyone swim around in this aquarium.

Color in a fish on the paper provided, and see the picture you have drawn come to life, swimming out into the massive aquarium in front of you together with the fish drawn by other people. If you touch the swimming fish, they will swim away. You can also feed the fish by touching the food bags.

The pictures people draw in Sketch Town can be made into an original paper craft.

Each of the pictures drawn in Sketch Town, such as cars and buildings, is converted into a plan for a paper craft model. By assembling along the plan guidelines, you can create a one-of-a-kind paper craft.

This is a game of hopscotch where you hop on the circles, triangles, and squares in the water.

When you land on the same shape several times in a row, a fish, butterfly, or bird is born. If you jump on many of the same shapes in a row, even more animals will appear.

And, if you consecutively jump on the same-colored shapes, that color will spread throughout the space.

If you touch the fish, butterflies, or birds that move along the walls, the animals will dissolve into the world.

This is a table where little people live.
If you put something, such as your hand, on top of the table, the little people will jump on to it. Depending on the shape of the objects you place on the table, the little people will slide, jump, or climb. Place many objects on the table and see the little people’s world transform into a completely new world.