Your Rainbow Panorama at ARoS in Aarhus, Denmark, by Olafur Eliasson
Your Rainbow Panorama by Olafur Eliasson
Your Rainbow Panorama is a gigantic, circular, walkway that appears to float above the ARoS Aarhus Kunstmuseum – art gallery in Denmark. The spectacular, walk-through work of art designed by Olafur Eliasson opened in 2011. Eliasson is a Danish–Icelandic artist, known for sculptures and large-scale installation artworks employing elemental materials such as light, water, and air.
Chosen Artist
In 2007 Eliasson and his studio won an invited architectural competition with a proposal to transform the rooftop of ARoS, built by Schmidt Hammer Lassen architects. Installed in 2011, Your rainbow panorama offers visitors sweeping views of the city, the sky, and the distant horizon. The elevated 360-degree walkway is glazed with rainbow-coloured glass. Visible from afar, the work divides Aarhus into various colour zones and acts as a beacon for people moving about the city – an effect that is heightened at night when lights running the circumference of the walkway illuminate it from within.
Giant Size
The panorama is 52m in diameter, the 3m wide walkway (circumference) is 150m long. The entrance and exits are on the inside of the circle, meaning the outside is a perfect unobstructed circle.
Rainbow Coloured Glass
The walkway is faced with 1500 square panels of coloured glass. These subtly merge through the colours of the rainbow. Looking into the centre of the circle combines other colours seen on the opposite side. The entrance walkway has clear glass on both sides, meaning in some places you can see the real colours outside.
Roof Terrace
From a series of exits it is possible to walk outside, down metal stairs to reach the planted roof terrace. Here is a great viewpoint over the city of Aarhus.
Evening Lighting
At dusk, subtle lighting appears from beneath the metal grills on the inside edge of the walkway. Light reflects from the ceiling giving an eery, other-worldly effect.
Exhibition in London
Eliasson’s Tate Modern exhibition in 2019 was a stunning retrospective, covering his career.
The ARoS Museum
ARoS is the cultural centrepiece of Aarhus, Denmark’s second largest city and one of the largest museums of its kind in Northern Europe. The building is designed specifically to welcome visitors, straddling a public thoroughfare that transforms the building into a bridge linking two of the city’s cultural centres. This public route through the museum provides a vital connection with the network of streets beyond, encouraging dynamic interplay between the museum and everyday life.
The building, set into the sloping site, has a footprint of 52 x 52 metres and stands almost 50 metres high. In contrast to the apparent severity of the exterior, the dazzling white interior, flooded with daylight, presents a sequence of highly organic sweeping curves that define the different levels of the building.
Architectural Photography
A wide angle 24mm lens was used throughout.
Available To Buy
These images and more are available to buy from Alamy picture library.
