gold room, two lead rooms, light, space.

Exhibitions
∙ LACMA, Los Angeles, 1981

Description
Silence and Ion Wind was a huge installation filling the entire Hammer wing of LACMA in 1981. It consisted of three chambers along a single axis, each treated in several different ways, with a clear progression of mounting interest from the first to the last. In the dimly lighted entrance chamber, one end of the axis was marked by a door-shaped rectangle of light projected on a wall, in the proportions of the Golden Rectangle (1.618 to 1). About fifty feet from the light door was a lead wall with a central doorway, also of Golden Section proportions, leading to the second chamber.

This second space was very dark. Facial recognition was impossible, and the sense of personal identity quickly faded. Behind the white scrim walls, layers of fiberglass insulation absorbed sound; the human voice flattened and disappears immediately. As one walked toward the third chamber - a tiny golden room which glowed invitingly at the end of the lon dark space - three coordinated changes took place (1) the darkness was progressively dispelled by golden light; (2) the silence increased, as the wall insulation thickened; (3) negative-ion generators near the golden room created an ion wind which increased its strength as one drew nearer. Negative ions, like the cosmic-ray void in Sunrise, are one of the invisible materials in the recipe. They increase in nature after a rain or near a waterfall; they are reputed to be invigorating and stress-reducing.

The tiny room at the end of the axis was electrostatically coated with 24-carat gold; the polished surface had been slightly clouded so it would reflect only light, not form. Warmly lighted from above, the little room glowed with a transcendental sheen. Entering its bright embrace (which could hold two or three people but was more comfortable for one) and gazing outward one’s eyes fixed on the light door at the other end of the axis, framed in the central leaden aperture - somehow the moment had a certain completeness, or peace.
-Excerpted from “The Art of Eric Orr: Negative Presences in Secret Spaces,” ARTFORUM, Summer 1982, by Tom McEvilley)

”You are walking into a space which is 99 feet long. You look to the right and three is a doorway of light. You look to the left and you see a large lead wall. There is no doorway in the wall. The doorway has no thickness. Through the doorway, there is progressive darkness, progressive silence. In the distance, there is a small golden room. You begin to walk towards the golden room. The space becomes increasingly silent. You are being bombarded with negative ions as you walk towards the gold room. Standing in the gold room, the shower of silence and negative ions is complete. “

-Eric Orr, Los Angeles County Museum of Art (1980)