The colors flashing across a screen in LACMA’s courtyard were hypnotic and unsettling. A pink Croc morphed into a glossy shade of black. Other sandals shifted between liquid shades of iridescent blue, lavender and bronze, as if vintage Urban Decay bottles had spilled across the art, leaving globs of Oil Slick, Smog and Asphyxia nail polish to ripple across the screen. So prismatic! So toxic! I couldn’t turn away.
Spirits is a series of digital sculptures mades by the Irish artist john gerrard using photoscans of 96 plastic sandals that he collected along beaches across the globe and a gaussian splatting technique that allows viewers to stream the images onto their devices and alter them with the touch of a finger. Batches of Spirits have been dropped via LACMA’s website since last December, their release dates coinciding solstices and equinoxes. The third installment of Spirits, all tied to the Mediterranean Sea, was unveiled on June 22, an in-person component, the Spirits Summer Solstice Dance, headlined by Richie Hawtin.
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