NAGI TEI is a small spatial structure composed entirely of ice, conceived as a single garden.

Three ice plates lean against one another at specific angles, forming a circular unit. This configuration is based on what the artist calls a “Reciprocal Laminar Structure,” in which elements support one another through their relationships rather than through fixed joints.  

 

This equilibrium is made possible by the low-temperature conditions characteristic of winter in Trondheim. Although ice is a fragile material, it maintains its form under cold conditions, shifting between states of freezing and melting. By presupposing this inherent instability, the structure is placed in a constant tension between completion and collapse.  

 

The number three was chosen as the minimum unit through which a mutually supportive structure can become self-sustaining. With two elements, the relationship becomes fixed; with four or more, forces disperse. Only through three points does the balance remain neither overly closed nor overly open. The contact surfaces between the ice plates change over time within the low-temperature environment, and their relationships continue to shift without becoming static. This condition can also be read as a form of interdependence.  

 

Multiple units are arranged like scattered fragments across a hill in a public park. Viewers walk around them, pause, and shift their viewpoints. Each change in viewing angle, distance, or light condition reveals a different expression of the ice. As the ice slowly melts, a thin film of water forms on its surface, reflecting light like the surface of a still lake. These reflections shift throughout the day, overlapping with the viewer’s movements and with the passage of time.  

 

NAGI TEI – The Rock Garden of Nagi

This work is shaped by memories of luminous lake surfaces, the artist’s first encounter with glaciers, and observations of the layered coastal rocks found along the Trondheim shoreline. These rocks were formed over geological time, gradually condensed and then slowly eroded and fractured by wind and rain. Ice undergoes a similar process: it condenses, solidifies, cracks, and eventually melts. The cycle of its formation and dissolution compresses the long temporal scale inherent to stone into a brief moment.  

 

NAGI TEI also connects to the lineage of Japanese dry landscape gardens (karesansui). While karesansui traditionally work with sand and stone to cultivate stillness and reflection, this work replaces immobile stones with ice—a material that changes over time. Here, the garden does not appear as a fixed landscape, but as a site that continually shifts in state.  

 

What this work presents is not merely an object to be observed. It invites viewers to place themselves within a temporary equilibrium that emerges between stillness and change, between being and non-being. NAGI TEI creates a fragile yet tangible spatial experience of coexisting with the forces of nature.