Weaving magic in ‘The Space between Us’

Janet Echelman’s art installations create an almost mystical connection between earth, light and air, appearing over the skylines in venues from Amsterdam, The Netherlands, to Sydney, Australia. GLOW 2013, an organization sponsoring a dusk-to-dawn art celebration held in Santa Monica, Calif., commissioned Echelman to help transform the beach into a “playground for thoughtful and participatory, temporary art” at its September 28 event.

Echelman’s air sculpture, called “The Space between Us,” consisted of twisted nylon and polyester netting illuminated by colored lighting and suspended over shaped mounds of beach sand. As air shifted the shape of the net and color highlighted its mutations, an estimated 150,000 GLOW 2013 visitors walked through the sand landscape under its undulations. An audio track provided peaceful nature-based music to immerse participants in the experience.

The net, installed 60 feet above the beach, was 130 by 110 feet in size. City Public Works staff helped carve the sand indentations for visitors to enter and gaze up at the sculpture, and alterations to the beach landscape beneath the sculpture was a departure for Echelman. “I’m interested in sculpting earth and sky, and placing ourselves in between,” she says. “My goal was to invite people to have an ephemeral sensory experience without words.” For more, visit Echelman’s website.