AQUARIUM ART INSTALLATION FOR FRIEZE ART FAIR
This aquarium art was produced by aquarium designers – Aquarium Architecture in conjunction with French artist Pierre Huyghe to originally showcase in the Frieze Art Fair 2010. It was later relocated to the Museum of Modern Art in New York. Huyghe was to present an aquarium for a marine ecosystem performance. Pierre Huyghe is a contemporary French artist based in Paris and New York renowned for his innovative and controversial projects.
He created a fictional narrative for crabs to enact by filling this aquarium with Mars-like red rock and assorted crabs, including a giant hermit crab that had taken a bronze cast of Brâncuși’s Sleeping Muse as its new home. The giant hermit crab lived within the muse’s head and transported the shiny sculpture all around a brutal landscape. The crab took on a curious and almost comical quality as it scurried around the aquarium.