Chris Fraser’s outdoor sculpture, Aura, will remain on view through January 31, 2016.

Oakland-based artist Chris Fraser brings his experiments in light, shadow and movement to the Scottsdale Museum of Contemporary Art’s fourth iteration of the groundbreaking series, Architecture + Art. Inspired by Arizona’s exquisite sky and the experimental architecture found at Biosphere II, Kitt Peak National Observatory and Arcosanti—Fraser will create a luminous room-sized environmental sculpture. Among the balanced columns and hemispheres situated in the space, shafts of light flood the interior as visitors navigate shape-shifting silhouettes. As in all of Fraser’s installations, the enveloping visual effects in Looking Back will be perceptible only as visitors carefully explore its interior. A second, optical installation outside the museum will reflect the desert sun.

Architecture + Art furthers the Scottsdale Museum of Contemporary Art’s mission to champion innovation in contemporary art, architecture and design. For this series, SMoCA commissions architects and artists to create site-specific installations in response to the spatial, environmental and social context of the Museum’s site in Scottsdale, Arizona. The series pushes forward this increasingly important area of creative activity in the field of contemporary art and the ways in which architecture is presented in an art museum setting.

Chris Fraser downloadable brochure.