Thorbjørn Lausten
Interview
This publication documents an interview between Thorbjørn Lausten and Stalke Galleri in connection with Lausten’s first exhibition at the gallery in 1987. The interview highlights Lausten’s conceptual and physical approach to light, energy, and perception in art. He presents works such as Determinator and Regenerator, where he explores light as both a physical phenomenon and a symbolic concept. The exhibition includes installations and drawings that relate to spatial and epistemological conditions. The interview offers a rare insight into Lausten’s profound reflections on the relationship between art, science, language, and systems thinking.
THORBJØRN LAUSTEN – Interview with Stalke Galleri (1987)
Complete English translation of the original two-page publication.
Based on concrete art, Thorbjørn Lausten has developed an installation practice in which perception is linked to conceptual formations drawn from several fields. His first electric sculptures/installations date from 1972, when he began to embed aspects of physics and epistemology in an artistic context. Since then he has produced a long series of works in which the perception and conceptualisation of time and energy are central, typically expressed through the use of intense white light. The lamps he employs are often wired to switching mechanisms—on/off, plus/minus—echoing the conceptual and cognitive universe he has built. (His works are represented in the National Gallery of Denmark and the Museum of Decorative Arts.)
INTERVIEW
STALKE: What will you be showing in the Project?
T. L.: Four things: two large installations and three smaller light pieces. In addition, a series of large drawings that relate to the exhibited works and reveal how I think and work. I am fascinated by lighting and by how we inhabit space; the interplay of different orders is crucial.
The two large pieces are about six metres long. One is called Determinator. The title contains several linguistic layers. The piece lies on the floor, combines powerful light sources with sculptural elements, and uses light both physically (through its kinetic-mechanical aspects) and symbolically.
The second piece, Regenerator, is more complex. It stands upright, hangs in space, and contains sculptural elements. It employs cosmic radiation: the installation is wired to a Geiger counter that triggers reactions whenever it detects electrons entering from the upper atmosphere. I expand this with a sculpture, so it spills into a larger part of the exhibition space. I also allow an element of chance: an atomic particle drives a processor-controlled programme that creates patterns—an interaction between randomness and structure. That interplay, and the problems it raises, is central to current discussions of systems theory.
STALKE: You work a great deal with light. Why?
T. L.: There are deep reasons and perhaps unconscious ones. Light is a visual core element, but I also view it conceptually. Much of my work explores the relation between energy and matter, made visible through light. Light carries religious and cultural-historical weight and has grown steadily more important in my practice.
Hence the classical painter has always been concerned with light, and in our century electricity has allowed us to reproduce and harness it. Beyond what we can see directly, light offers insights into what we call nature. Light serves as a metaphor for how nature—matter—functions; through light we learn how matter works down to its smallest particles, which brings us into quantum mechanics.
Quantum mechanics (the workings of atoms) was formulated early in this century in an attempt to understand the inner nature of matter—of light itself. That project can never fully succeed, yet I regard light as a natural artistic medium for a century so deeply shaped by a transformed physical world-view. And, as I said, light also embraces many psychological aspects.
STALKE: Why do you in particular use white light?
T. L.: White light is a blend of all frequencies, in other words of all the colours we know; coloured light is simply a splitting of white light. That is only the physical facet. The psychological dimension is harder to exhaust. Both white hues and white light carry symbolic, cultural-historical and religious meanings. Personally, white light appeals to me far more than coloured light—perhaps because of an artistic tradition in which figures such as Malevich and Mondrian, and other Constructivists with whom I share a kinship, play a part.
STALKE: The titles of the works you show here include “Determinator” and “Regenerator”. What do they mean?
T. L.: I often use titles ending in “-tor”—to stress that something is functioning now. The prefix “de-” normally negates what follows; “-terminator” in English is something that ends or destroys. Determinator is the opposite. For years I have treated it as a kind of anti-entropy: a structuring force. Yet it is also destructive, because it is a dissipative process in which light/energy spreads continuously without seeming to obey any law—disappearing like a blind force of nature.
In Danish we also say “at være determineret” (“to be determined”). One can say of this piece that it is determined, structured in the way I have decided. That, broadly, is why I call it Determinator.
Regenerator looks back to earlier works I called Generators, which explored continuous becoming. Regeneratorrepeats that idea while also reworking the aspect—present in almost every phenomenon—that repetition inevitably occurs.
Within both art and psychology there is an interesting phenomenon: when we look at empty things—so-called empty surfaces—we often project meaning onto them. That meaning tends to vanish and return later. I believe this is common to many artworks that try to go beyond what we usually call the aesthetic function.