Studio Other Spaces (SOS) – led by artist Olafur Eliasson and architect Sebastian Behmann – designed Common Sky, a canopy of glass and mirrors that envelops the courtyard of the Seymour H. Knox Building. Both a sculpture and an architectural structure, Common Sky provides a space that is free and open to the public, and that reflects the museum’s vision of a twenty-first-century art institution of inclusion.
Common Sky is a celebration of the sky as common. The glass roof acts as a lens, inviting people to connect with their immediate environment and bringing into focus the ephemeral qualities of the atmosphere: the changing seasons, the dappled light, and the cloud formations. The alternating mirror and transparent glass panels emphasize physical movement as a means to shape space, making visitors visible within the work and prompting them to co-create fragmented inward and outward perspectives. The various angles of the mirrors cast complex, kaleidoscopic reflections that frame unexpected views as people move around the courtyard below.
