Overview

A painting is something you look at. A sculpture is something you walk around. An installation is something you walk into. It surrounds you. It uses the entire room—the walls, the floor, the lights, the smell—to create an immersive environment. It turns the viewer from a passive observer into an active participant.

Core Idea

The core idea is Experience. The art is not an object; it is a situation. You can’t buy it and take it home (usually). You have to be there. It is about how your body moves through space and how the space makes you feel (claustrophobic, awed, disoriented).

Formal Definition

Artworks that are created for a specific site and arrange objects in a space to create a total environment.

Intuition

Imagine walking into a room filled with waist-high fog. You can’t see your feet. The light is colored. You feel like you are floating in a cloud. That is an installation (specifically, by Olafur Eliasson). It changes your reality for a few minutes.

Examples

  • Yayoi Kusama, Infinity Mirror Rooms: Small rooms lined with mirrors and filled with LED lights. When you step inside, the lights reflect forever, making you feel like you are floating in space. It is the most Instagrammed art in the world.
  • Olafur Eliasson, The Weather Project (2003): He installed a giant fake sun and mirrors on the ceiling of the Tate Modern in London. It filled the massive hall with orange mist. People lay on the floor for hours, basking in the artificial light.
  • Judy Chicago, The Dinner Party (1979): A massive triangular table with place settings for 39 mythical and historical women. It is an installation that functions as a feminist monument.

Common Misconceptions

  • It’s just decoration: Good installation art isn’t just “vibes.” It has a conceptual point. Kusama’s mirrors are about her mental illness and hallucinations (obliteration of the self).
  • It’s new: While the term is recent (1970s), the concept is old. A Baroque church or a prehistoric cave with paintings and firelight were essentially immersive installations.
  • Site-Specificity: Like Land Art, many installations are built for one specific room and can’t be moved.
  • Interactive Art: Many installations require the audience to touch things, press buttons, or eat food (Rirkrit Tiravanija cooked Thai curry for visitors).
  • Video Installation: Using multiple projectors to surround the viewer with moving images.

Applications

  • Retail Design: Cool shops (like Dover Street Market) use installation art techniques to make shopping an “experience.”
  • Theme Parks: Disney’s Haunted Mansion is basically a high-budget, narrative installation art piece.

Criticism / Limitations

  • The “Spectacle”: Critics argue that installation art (especially the big, shiny kind like Kusama) is just entertainment for the selfie generation. It’s “Art for Instagram.”
  • Storage: Museums hate collecting it. How do you store a room full of fog? Or a pile of rotting candy (Felix Gonzalez-Torres)? It is a conservation nightmare.

Further Reading

  • Bishop, Claire. Installation Art: A Critical History. 2005.
  • Reiss, Julie. From Margin to Center: The Spaces of Installation Art. 1999.
  • O’Doherty, Brian. Inside the White Cube. 1976.