Transcending Boundaries

Butterflies flap, a wild ocean rages and a waterfall cascades through the space in teamLab’s digital art exhibition, currently on show at Pace London.

In the mind, there are no boundaries between ideas and concepts, they are inherently ambiguous and influence and interact with each other. In order for ideas and concepts to be expressed in the real world it is necessary to have a physical material substance through which they are mediated. Boundaries are created when ideas and concepts are materialized in the real world.

Within the digital domain, art is able to transcend physical and conceptual boundaries. Digital technology allows art to break free from the frame and go beyond the boundaries that separate one work from another. Elements from one work can fluidly interact with and influence elements of the other works exhibited in the same space. In this way, the boundaries between art pieces dissolve.

teamLab (f. 2001, Tokyo, by Toshiyuki Inoko) is an interdisciplinary group of ultra-technologists whose collaborative practice seeks to navigate the confluence of art, technology, design and the natural world. Rooted in the tradition of ancient Japanese Art and contemporary forms of anime, teamLab operates from a distinctly Japanese sense of spatial recognition, investigating human behavior in the information era and proposing innovative models for societal development