Medium: Panoramic composite on canvas - Installation art

Size: Eight panels 7 feet tall and 4 feet wide arranged in a circle

Year: 2008

Description: Norwegian Nights is the first of a projected series of installation pieces entitled “Outside Inn”. This series of environmental art pieces brings the vastness, greatness and beauty of the outdoors indoors. It brings the mountains, ocean and woods to the viewer in the urban and suburban areas. It reconnects the viewers with the natural world, with the grand open spaces which she might not have had the opportunity to experience. The pieces are meant to remind the viewers of the amazing world of which we are a part, by putting them in the middle of it. They are what I dub “green art” - their purpose to remind the onlooker in a way that is neither preachy nor overbearing, but experiential and meditative, of the world we share and are the stewards of. It is also meant to stir in the viewer’s soul, a longing for these places and a desire to commune with nature. The central part of this installation art piece is a large panorama of the landscape at the foot of Gaustadtoppen in Telemark in Norway. It is close to where my father grew up in Rjukan and one of the most beautiful places I know. I photographed it late in the evening last June after an attempted hike to its summit was interrupted by a passing storm. On the way back down a perfect rainbow appeared across the sky, a consolation price of large proportions. The landscape with the rainbow was photographed in 23 individual pieces which I later “stitched” together to form a large panorama. The panorama itself will be printed on 8 panels each 7 feet (2 meters) high and 4 feet (1.25 meters) wide which will be arranged in a circle surrounded by a curtain of LED lights. Outermost will hang a ring of sheer fabric which will diffuse the lights and create an appearance of clouds. The wall of light, about 32 feet (12 meters) in circumference will be a magnet, attracting the viewer to its glowing mystery. The onlooker will have to part the sheer curtains, pass through the wall of lights to enter the inner sanctum where they will be surrounded by the mountains. They will not only have symbolically entered a sacred space, but will have scaled the mountains to be contained within them.The wall of light which surrounds this temple of nature also represents Norway’s endless summer nights, the light that does not fade, the nights which dreams forgot. It is an artwork which appeals to many of the senses – the visual, through the images and the light, the tactile by the brushing aside of the fabric and the parting of the canvas, and also the auditory, as sounds of mountain brooks, wind, music and poetry will be played in a loop inside the circle. Sewn to the bottom of the panorama panels will be small bells, which when moved by passing air currents, or moved by someone coming or leaving the circle, will chime like the bells of the sheep roaming the mountain meadows. In the middle of the circle three low, round seats will be available for the public to relax on and experience the environment, reconnect with nature and spur them hopefully into the great outdoors, and maybe even all the way to Norway and Gausta Toppen! I can envision this as a wonderful traveling art show, with different circles – a mountain scene, a seaside scene, a forest and a desert scene for example. These could be put up in schools, particularly in urban under-privileged areas, where some children may never have had an outdoor experience, never have felt and been overwhelmed by the rugged beauty of our world. Having not experienced the solace nature can bring they do not have a stake in preserving it.