The Oort Cloud and the Blue Mountain is an interactive installation artwork commissioned by the National Gallery Singapore for the Children Biennale in 2019 - Embracing the Senses. The title of the work takes its reference to an early 20th C. painting by Wassily Kandinsky, The Blue Mountain and an astronomical phenomenon, the Oort Cloud.

 

These two references signify the dual notions of tangibility and intangibility. The Blue Mountain is a painting that depicts a visage of colours and forms that allude to mountains, landscape and horses. The Oort Cloud, on the other hand, is described as an extended shell of icy objects that exist on the outer reaches of our solar system.

 

The Oort Cloud, being so far removed from our human capacity to experience, is the opposite of tangibility and perceptibility which the Blue Mountain represents. It signifies human’s limitation in fully understanding, comprehending and perceiving certain phenomenon and can only remain isolated, inaccessible and distant from our senses.

 

The work intends to refer to this broader idea of senses and/or the limit of sensing - that some things can be tangible and sensed, but remain as a mystery and can only be perceived in a limited way. 

 

With this in mind, this work is arranged in a playful manner with an assortment of objects that converse with one another. They are arranged to depict a drawing composition, akin to an abstract landscape or terrain, with considerations to colours, forms, depth and textures. Through interactions with buttons, tactile surfaces and sensors, objects on the upper wall are then set in motion, lit up or create sounds at varying paces. Initiated by the sense of touch and proximity, this wall comes alive and engages audiences on a sensory adventure - one that enlivens this transitional corridor space with forms, sounds, colours and movements, albeit through curious connectivity that audiences had activated.

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Hazel wrote a blog entry in the National Gallery Singapore site: 

https://www.nationalgallery.sg/blog/children-are-never-world-weary

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