<http://schema.org/articleBody>
"   There was a time not so long ago when I had this gnawing feeling of being a midcareer artist who was going nowhere,&amp;quot; says James Turrell, who&amp;#039;s being feted this summer with three coordinated, successive retrospectives at the Los Angeles County Museum of Art; the Museum of Fine Arts, Houston; and the Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum in New York City. &amp;quot;Now when you find yourself in the middle of nowhere, I feel like you&amp;#039;re probably pretty near my art.&amp;quot; The Santa-bearded septuagenarian, known for his work with light and its interaction with space, isn&amp;#039;t understating: He&amp;#039;s built site-specific installations in 25 countries as far afield as Norway and Argentina and has devoted the past three decades to his still-in-progress magnum opus, Roden Crater, an extinct volcano on the edge of Arizona&amp;#039;s Painted Desert that he&amp;#039;s modifying with underground tunnels and observation points. Thus, a new commission, Akhob, at the decidedly bustling Louis Vuitton Maison City Center in Las Vegas, the neon capital, is perhaps his most improbably located. The installation occupies a discrete but sizeable area made available by virtue of Daniel Libeskind&amp;#039;s irregular architectural design for the Shops at Crystals\u2014a futuristic luxury mall that houses several smaller-scale Turrell pieces. Taking its name from the ancient Egyptian for &amp;quot;pure water,&amp;quot; Akhob is the largest work to date in Turrell&amp;#039;s ongoing exploration of the ganzfeld effect, or a loss of depth perception that can occur while staring at a uniform field of color. After donning protective white bootees and entering the tomblike structure through a darkened passageway, one is free to move through two chambers bathed in a sequence of programmed LED hues\u2014pink, purple, yellow-orange, blue, peach\u2014that, while bringing to mind an utterly surreal sunset, challenge one&amp;#039;s sense of one&amp;#039;s own parameters. (For the record: the space rises 58 feet at its highest, and white-suited student docents from the Art Institute of Las Vegas stop you should you come within 18 inches of a wall.) &amp;quot;It&amp;#039;s a bit of the antithesis of what&amp;#039;s outside the building,&amp;quot; notes Turrell of the contrast between his indoor light show and the giant billboards\u2014advertising quickie weddings, Avicii concerts, or, for that matter, handbags\u2014on the Strip. &amp;quot;Signs flash to capture your attention,&amp;quot; he reflects. &amp;quot;My aim is to encourage people to look up.&amp;quot; By appointment only; 702-730-3150 "^^<http://www.w3.org/2001/XMLSchema#string>
<http://www.elle.com/culture/art-design/a13839/artist-james-turrell-las-vegas-project/?click=main_sr>