MACRO inaugurates the entrance to its new wing with a site specific installation by Jacob Hashimoto. Silence Still Governs Our Consciousness creates a floating realm which anticipates the journey from MACRO’s present to its future. Hashimoto conceived this “cloud of 7000 kites” specifically for MACRO’s new exhibition gallery. The work fills the room like a “diaphanous canopy” evoking in its spectators the sensation of being “surrounded by a mist filled forest of kites and strings - a quiet, meditative, sculptural environment.” The piece synthesizes nature and technology to yield a fluid and organic landscape. This encourages meditation and evokes new readings of the gallery: as a void, as space, or as time.

The Fondazione Musei Civici di Venezia and the Vervoordt Foundation announce In-finitum, taking place in the Palazzo Fortuny in Venice from 6 June until 15 November, 2009. With In-finitum, the trilogy which started with Artempo: Where Time Becomes Art (Venice, 2007) and continued with Academia: Qui es-tu? (Paris, 2008) will come full circle. Once again set in the magnificent surroundings of the Palazzo Fortuny, In-finitum will guide the visitor from the soul of the unfinished to the border of the infinite, a spiritual journey along works of art abundant with energy. The trilogy as conceived by Axel Vervoordt establishes a perfect balance through the natural time-flow between its three chapters. Artempo: Where Time Becomes Art dealt with the beauty of passing time touching the world, with the mysteriousness of patina and the magical osmosis which exists where cosmos and matière interact. In Academia: Qui es-tu?, the transmission of knowledge and wisdom held center stage, a fixed focal point gently rocked however by the continuous perpetuum mobile of questions and answers. The finale, In-finitum, will traverse into the other realm as it reaches into the universe of the unfinished and the infinite.

Superabundant Atmosphere, an installation by Jacob Hashimoto includes thousands of shimmering white “kites,” each handmade from silk glued over a tied bamboo frame. During the installation process, Hashimoto and five assistants will string the kites together and suspend them from the gallery ceiling, creating an enormous sculptural cloud rising upward and outward from the rear of the gallery. Although Hashimoto makes use of traditional kite-making materials and techniques, the small kites that form his installations do not actually fly. Instead, they are the modular units that he multiplies and arranges into structures that, while monumental in scale, appear to be weightless. As the light that streams through the gallery’s front window changes throughout the day, so too, will the appearance of Superabundant Atmosphere. Sometimes the installation will seem buoyant and ethereal, while at other times it will appear to be a solid mass. In any guise, Hashimoto intends for Superabundant Atmosphere to convey a sense of wonder and playfulness, as visitors encounter, walk around, and react to its presence.