TEAMLAB

Founded by Toshiyuki Inoko in Tokyo in 2001, teamLab is an international collective of artists, programmers,engineers, CG animators, mathematicians, and architects. Known for its multisensory, immersive work, teamLabexplores the relationships between humans and the world, encouraging new modes of perception through itspioneering, technologically advanced installations. In recent years, teamLab has presented solo exhibitions at theAsian Art Museum in San Francisco; Amos Rex in Helsinki; TANK Shanghai; and many other institutions and venuesaround the world.

In the upcoming exhibition at Pace in New York, The World of Irreversible Change will be projected on a large,freestanding, black-painted wall in a darkened gallery space. First presented by the collective in spring 2022 at theAomori Museum of Art in Japan, this screen-based work, created by teamLab over five years, has never before beenexhibited as a projection. Conceptually, The World of Irreversible Change centers on everyday life in an anonymouscity during an unspecified epoch. Animated figures move throughout the panoramic village scene, which will changewith the time of day and weather in New York. Scenery and stories will unfold each day, and the lives of the people inthe city will continue eternally unless gallery visitors interact with the work, causing permanent disruption.

Over the course of its exhibition at Pace, The World of Irreversible Change can transform as a result of viewers’engagement with it. If visitors continue to intervene with the work during its three-month presentation, the scenes ofdaily life will become increasingly agitated and chaotic, with fighting between individuals escalating into an all-outwar. Peace and harmony will give way to fire and destruction, a devolution that speaks to the inherency anduniversality of violence in the human experience. The city will become forever devoid of people, while plants willbegin populating its streets and ruins over time.

‘In the ruined city where not a single person remains, the seasons still pass and the sun rises and sets with the timeof the real world,’ teamLab writes in a statement on The World of Irreversible Change. ‘After a while, new flora beginto grow in the burnt ruins of the city. The flora grow, bloom, and scatter repeatedly, changing daily with the realpassage of time ... Once the world of this artwork begins to burn, the world from before can never be returned to. Thepeople who interact with the artwork cause this outcome.’

Along with its forthcoming presentation of The World of Irreversible Change at Pace’s New York gallery, teamLab willpresent an interactive installation as part of Art@Harbour 2024 in Hong Kong, running from March 25 to June 2. Thecollective also recently established teamLab Borderless, a permanent museum of over 70 digital works presented asone continuous world within a multi-room exhibition space, in Tokyo’s Azabudai Hills development, which is alsohome to Pace’s new gallery in the Japanese capital, opening this summer. Following Tokyo, teamLab Borderless willopen in Jeddah, Saudi Arabia and Hamburg, Germany, and teamLab is also preparing to open a massive 17,000square-meter (nearly 183,000 square-feet) experiential art space in Abu Dhabi. Later this year, teamLab’s annualexhibition in the ancient forest of Mifuneyama Rakuen in Kyushu, Japan will take place for the tenth year.

Press release courtesy Pace Gallery