在阳光洒落的草地上，四只毛茸茸的草原犬鼠正围成一圈，像是在悄悄交换彼此的小秘密。它们胖嘟嘟的身体、圆溜溜的眼睛以及灵巧的小爪子，构成了令人无法抗拒的萌态。一只站得笔直，像个警惕的小哨兵，另一只则蹲在地上，两只前爪轻拍着伙伴，仿佛在催促玩耍。草原犬鼠是一种群居动物，善于用叫声交流，彼此之间有着紧密的社交关系。它们的互动既温馨又富有趣味，让人感受到自然界中最纯真的陪伴与信任。在这个快节奏的社会中，看到这四只天真无邪的小生灵，仿佛也提醒我们慢下来，珍惜身边那些微小却真实的情感与联系。有时候，幸福不过就是和朋友并肩晒太阳，分享一段安静的时光。
Usually when a museum is flooded with water, something has gone seriously wrong. But at the Fondation Beyeler just outside the Swiss city of Basel, the flooding of the museum is all part of the show: a new site-specific installation called Life by the Danish-Icelandic artist Olafur Eliasson.
The artist has removed one side of the Renzo Piano-designed building (with the architect’s blessing) and let the feature pond—usually separated from the climate-controlled interior by a large glass wall—into the museum. Visitors can navigate the waters, which are up to 80cm deep, using a series of walkways that run in and out of the building. At night, the interior is lit up with blue light.
Eliasson has also dyed the water a fluorescent green and filled it with pond plants, including water lilies and shellflowers selected by the landscape architect Günther Vogt. The water has been coloured using uranine, an organic dye that is commonly used to observe water currents, and which Eliasson has used previously for his Green River (1998) work where he dyed rivers in cities such as Stockholm, Tokyo and Los Angeles.
In an accompanying artist statement, Eliasson writes: “Together with the museum, I am giving up control over the artwork, so to speak, handing it over to human and non-human visitors, to plants, microorganisms, the weather, the climate—many of these elements that museums usually work very hard to keep out.”
The southern side of the building will be open to the elements for the duration of the show, which ends in July. Eliasson writes that “even if no human visitors are in the space, other beings—insects, bats, or birds, for instance—can fly through or take up temporary abode within it.” This possibility is very much part of the work, with the artist adding that when he first spoke to the museum’s director Sam Keller about ideas for the show, he thought to himself: “Why don’t we invite everyone to the show? Let’s invite the planet—plants and various species”.
The show is open 24 hours a day. “Visitors can access the installation at any time. After 9.30pm they do not need a ticket,” says a spokeswoman. She adds that, in terms of non-human visitors, so far there have been “insects, spiders, ducks, a goose and cats.”