Selected work / Optical apparatus
Abyss 2025
An optical apparatus whose opening returns the viewer’s own eye.
- Medium
- Optical apparatus
- Materials
- ABS resin, aluminum, glass
- Dimensions
- W140 × H70 × D69 mm
Looking at the eye
Look into Abyss and the opening returns the viewer’s own eye. The organ used to observe the world becomes the subject of the view. An eyepiece normally directs attention beyond the apparatus; here, attention is turned towards the person looking through it.
The observer enters the view
Like Reflex, Abyss brings the observer into the observed field. Its subject is the eye itself, rather than the enlarged face encountered in Reflex. This precise difference matters within Matsuura’s group of viewing apparatuses: each object changes a particular condition of looking. Abyss concentrates that inquiry on the bodily organ through which the encounter takes place.