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SOFTlab

SOFTlab

New York, NY

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Infinity Field

A field of fifty vertical mirrored chambers on the seventh floor plaza of Iconsiam, a mixed-use development on the banks of the Chao Phraya River in Bangkok, Thailand. The mirrored chambers occupy the space between a series of reflecting pools and the main entrance. The random placement of the vertical elements along with their reflective surfaces provides a forest-like arrangement of shifting reflections for visitors to pause, wonder through, or simply pass by. 

As visitors pass through the mirrors during the day they encounter a field of reflections that mix reflections of their surroundings, themselves, and the Bangkok skyline. As visitors approach the inside of the forest of mirrors they become part of a mise en abyme (“placed into abyss”) or image within an image. The Droste effect produced by the mirrors reflected off one another produces an ever changing infinite reflection. At night the mirrored chambers are lit from within with LEDs that respond to sound. The chambers are clad in one way mirrored glass and when they are lit from within the repeated nature of their outward reflection is inverted, creating an infinite field of light in each chamber.

The ambient state of the light field is a subtle wave that is evocative of the Chao Phraya River that passes through Bangkok directly in front of the terrace. The lights are activated by sound in a variety of animated behaviors from a random matrix of light to a large light pulse through the forest of mirrors. The diamond-shaped chambers of Infinity Field follows the tile pattern of the plaza and produces an immersive environment that remixes sound and light with the movement of visitors and the backdrop of the Bangkok skyline. At night the vertical repetition of the chambers and the reflections of the skyline gives the impression that you are walking through the city at a strange scale, while surrounding sound is given a material quality through light and the oscillation of the glass surfaces between reflective and transparent.

 
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Status: Built
Location: Bangkok, TH
Firm Role: Designer