Jeppe Hein
The Danish installation artist Jeppe Hein (born 1974 in Copenhagen, Denmark) is regarded as a pioneer of a playful new approach to contemporary sculpture. His sculptural work is grounded in the austere formal language of Minimalism, but with a dynamic generated by movement, kinetic imagination, and interactive surprises. For example, a bench suddenly begins to move when sat on (activated by body weight), mirrors generate new spatial dimensions, or viewers become enclosed in walls of water spouting out of rows of nozzles. Hein’s installations like “Spiral Labyrinth I” (2006) or “Rotating Pyramid” (2007) clearly demonstrate his architectural and interactive configurations, as does his “Hexagonal Water Pavilion” from 2012, which is a walk-in fountain whose changing walls of water are lit every night.
One of his benches, the “Loop Bench” (2006), looks as if a regular park bench where people can sit was stretched into a huge overlapping and curving loop and is an example of how many of his installations are meant to be used by people to interact and overcome social barriers.
In another work featuring a smoking bench in front of a wall mirror, he creates an entertaining game of (self-)perception. When visitors sit down on the bench, facing their reflection in the mirror, smoke streams out from under them until they are hidden from view. Visitors can thus reflect on and contemplate themselves in a situation that plays with self-perception and the perception of others. When entering Hein’s installations, everything seems to move autonomously: An unsuspecting step in the right place causes a ball to roll, while another movement causes lamps to light up. Because, as beholders, we have the tendency to establish a relationship with something that moves, it is easy to believe that the kinetic objects are watching us. These interactive, synesthetic works are the products of a playful and experimental working method that primarily appeals to the child within us and has the potential to contribute to an open, communicative world view.
Dominique von Burg
One of his benches, the “Loop Bench” (2006), looks as if a regular park bench where people can sit was stretched into a huge overlapping and curving loop and is an example of how many of his installations are meant to be used by people to interact and overcome social barriers.
In another work featuring a smoking bench in front of a wall mirror, he creates an entertaining game of (self-)perception. When visitors sit down on the bench, facing their reflection in the mirror, smoke streams out from under them until they are hidden from view. Visitors can thus reflect on and contemplate themselves in a situation that plays with self-perception and the perception of others. When entering Hein’s installations, everything seems to move autonomously: An unsuspecting step in the right place causes a ball to roll, while another movement causes lamps to light up. Because, as beholders, we have the tendency to establish a relationship with something that moves, it is easy to believe that the kinetic objects are watching us. These interactive, synesthetic works are the products of a playful and experimental working method that primarily appeals to the child within us and has the potential to contribute to an open, communicative world view.
Dominique von Burg
Works by Jeppe Hein
