noted

Not Stars but Post-it Notes

Slowly at first, then more frequently, tiny yellow specks come into view. Mostly they appear one by one, but sometimes a pair emerge. Like stars appearing at twilight, the post-it notes, stuck on the floor by visitors to Olafur Eliasson’s ‘The Weather Project’ on Friday 21 November, 2003, gradually appear as constellations in the mirrored ceiling of Tate Modern’s Turbine Hall.

Each note was left by someone who had been lying in the installation, soaking up the rays of the vast, artificial sun. Love, peace, sex and cosmic energy were recurrent themes in the notes, suggesting visitors inebriated with the vastness of life. It seems people had taken both the installation and the invitation to leave a memory behind, as a starting point for free time travel within the limitless zones of memory.

Memories, like stars, have permanence often belied by their flickering appearance. What do we remember and how do we recount what we remember? What should remain when a life, love or an event has gone? These were the questions that moved Angela Poole, Julie Hoyle and Deborah True to make Noted, and which Noted in turn moves its readers to reflect on.

Sophie Howarth
Tate Modern

noted
Book: Ink Jet Print, 18.0 cm x 29.5 cm (Edition of 10) Selected pages from noted © Deborah True in collaboration with Julie Hoyle and Angie Poole in association with Tate Modern

Above: a selection of post-it notes gathered from Tate Modern's Turbine Hall floor that had been left behind by visitors to Olafur Eliassion's installation, The Weather Project

Noted-image-for-page-1-a
Noted-image-for-page-4a
Noted-inage-for-page-2-a

The Weather Project installation by Olafur Eliasson at Tate Modern's Turbine Hall in 2003
Photographs by Julie Hoyle

All work © Deborah True 2021

Selected Works

Mending the TutuProject type

TeleidoscopesProject type

Teleidoscope RubbingsProject type

Teleidoscope DrawingsProject type

Wall HangingProject type

Somerset WatersProject type

dance, text, drawProject type

Mapping with ThreadsProject type

ThreadsProject type

notedProject type

Forget-Me-NotProject type