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Forest of Numbers
(National Art Center, Tokio)
von Emmanuelle Moureaux, Tokio

www.emmanuelle.jp

The National Art Center in Tokyo celebrated its 10th anniversary

in January. On this occasion, an exhibition presented the muse-

um's activities of the past ten years in the special exhibition

room, which was accompanied by the large installation "Forest

of Numbers" - as a symbol of the next ten years to come. Used

without any partition walls for the first time, the 2,000-square

meter White Cube exhibition room became the canvas of the

installation, filled with the largest installation of Emmanuelle

Moureaux's work. The installation visualized the next decade

from 2017 to 2026, and created a sense of stillness across the

large exhibition space. More than 60,000 suspended numeral

figures from 0 to 9 were regularly aligned in three-dimensional

grids. A section was removed to create a path that cut through

the installation, inviting visitors to wonder inside the colourful
forest filled with numbers. The installation was composed of ten

layers which represented ten years time. Each layer used four

digits to express the relevant year such as 2, 0, 1, and 7 for 2017,

which were randomly positioned on the grids. This installation

was implemented with the help of 300 volunteers, it attracted

over 20,000 visitors in ten days.

Fotos: Daisuke Shima