james turrell & lalique share the same light & space
American light artist James Turrellfamous for his Skyspaceand French luxury brand Lalique work on a modern collection of crystal light panels and perfumes which will debut at Paris+ Art Basel on October 20th. James and René Lalique, known as ‘the sculptor of light,’ share a collective admiration for being light and space buffs. They attempt to bend the human perception by perusing beauty and life from an artistic point-of-view, and their reverence for their oeuvre, light, and space spring in Crystal Light Panels, which showcase 30 different color sequences made to trigger a vibrational reaction, and Ranger Rider and Purple Sage, two exclusive fragrances made for the masculine and feminine respectively.
The Crystal Light Panels ripple to draw the viewers into the shifting hues and lines they anchor, a peer through the metaphorical significance of intimacy that feeds one’s soul. As James puts it, light is closely linked to life and his photographic works exclusively made for Lalique ring in that life through the diffusion and change of color. For the perfumes, Ranger Rider and Purple Sage reflect the pursuit of James in studying a Western novel that is dear to him. From the bottles to the scents, the perfumes are inspired by desert ranges and light horizons, and the Great American West depicted by Zane Gray in his novel, Riders of the Purple Sage. For the bottle shapes, James looks to Egyptian architecture, noting the relation of pyramid structures to high light and spiritual value.
images courtesy of Lalique & James Turrell
James Turrell finds the scent of the Colorado Plateau
James Turrell seeks to uncover the scent of the Colorado Plateau and that of the purple sage that Zane Gray describes in his novel, Riders of the Purple Sage. The American artist then combines the scents to create an evocative fragrance of purple sage and old rubbed leather , ‘the same ones that cling to our chaps when my wife Kyung and I return to our ranch,’ he adds.
The result grows as Ranger Rider and Purple Sage, a homage to the Gray novel and James’ fragrance for men and women. Now that the scents have been concocted, tweaked, and unveiled, James moves on to the shape of the bottles. The artist has long been fascinated by Egypt and the stupa shapes found in Asia, especially in Tibet, Thailand, Sri Lanka, Burma, China, and Japan. He marvels at their architectural structure, noting the rigid lines and pointed tip of the pyramids, and observes how light sweep in to play its role as a highly spiritual and valuable character that underlines these architectural wonders.
James takes his inspirational cues from this well and comes out with two bottle designs: one shaped like the Egyptian pyramids and the other forming a dome curve. James gets on with a design that ensures the flow and cadence of light, all while allowing a slight coloring to shine through. He has been present throughout the production and even stopped by Wingen-sur-Moder, a comune in France, to see the bottles be brought to life, an experience that made James remember René Lalique and how he got started.
Ranger Rider perfume
Crystal Light Panels study the brilliance of crystal
Like a mentor to his mentee, James Turrell reminds his art enthusiasts about the fluidity of crystal. ‘Of course, this is not evident at room temperature,’ he adds. Holding the glass, one may not immediately realize how beautiful the liquid inside is, focusing rather on the structure of the glass, the way the hand folds around it and the bottom slopes so the person could drink up every last drop.
‘Liquid crystal can take on a shape and keep that shape,’ James says. ‘But after a hundred or two years, it succumbs to gravity. This is why we have to turn the lenses in telescopes.’ The character of crystal comes to the fore from here. It becomes a spiritual medium that possesses underrated brilliance, a material that creatives can toy with. In his Crystal Light Panels, that is how exactly James approached it. He manipulates it so well that viewers have to halt to triple-check whether what they are looking at overlaps or is just a sphere in a single loop.
From explaining how his collaboration with Lalique came about, James touches on his ultimate aim in his art. His penchant lies in the light people see when they close their eyes, the one that appears in their dream whether as a supporting character or the main. He is interested in bringing the same light to life: the burst that veers from being another déjà vu phenomenon, the beam that shows itself even when people are awake, and the ray that gains momentum and value over time.
‘We are quite unaware of the power of light. I would like to make light such that it is an inspiration to things beyond, beyond what we think we know,’ he says. The light that James wants to produce, the same one he gave birth to for the collection with Laliqueis all-encompassing: it envelops, it is experienced, it makes viewers think, and it reconfigures their being.