Aliya Orr, a multidisciplinary artist, shares what inspired her to create Shimmer Time , which is installed on the west wall of Lonsdale Quay Exchange in North Vancouver.

Video Transcript

I hope the work inspires people to take a minute off their screens and to take in the world around them. The small details: subtle shifts of light, subtle shifts colour. These small things that transform the world around us.

I was really inspired by this incredibly unique journey of the SeaBus crossing, coming and visiting North Vancouver. And I wanted to extend that experience into this space.

The SeaBus crossing is a 12-minute journey and in that time, anything can happen. The smallest thing from the sun coming out and hitting the light on the water, or to the cries of excitement of a small child who’s experiencing the water as it rocks back and forth. That kind of thing is what really inspires me as an artist — those emotions.

I thought about how to bring that spirit of aliveness that I experienced in the SeaBus journey into this space. I actually did a bunch of field recordings on that journey. So, I took photographs and I also recorded my brain as I meditated and as I experienced the sensations of that journey. I then took those and I constructed them as wave forms. And through that I created the physical structure of the artwork.

I think what’s really interesting about the piece is that although it’s a large-scale work, there are many tableaus or frames within it. That was really conceived in relation to the space because people sit and wait for the bus at the variety of stations in this bus station.

I wanted to think about how you might come here on one day and have one experience, but you might come another day and have a completely different experience. The idea is this artwork is constantly transforming. I wanted to have that changeability and that feeling of it being alive.

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