John Gerrard and LACMA Complete The Year-Long Digital-Art Project, “SPIRITS”

The Los Angeles County Museum of Art and Irish artist John Gerrard have completed “SPIRITS,” a year-long digital artwork commissioned by the museum’s Art + Technology Lab, with the debut of its fourth and final chapter, “Autumn Equinox (Atlantic Ocean).” The release marks the first time all four chapters are viewable together, through December 21. Presented on LACMA’s homepage since Winter Solstice 2025, “SPIRITS” transforms 96 discarded plastic sandals collected from the Pacific, Indian, Mediterranean, and Atlantic Oceans into interactive virtual sculptures using gaussian splatting, and a real-time 3D-rendering technique Gerrard calls “image objects.”

The work meditates on humanity’s dependence on petroleum, with each seasonal chapter tied to an astronomical event and body of water. “The Atlantic spirits are a rising electronic lament for a heating earth,” said Gerrard of the final installment, which begins with petroleum “in a raw and quieter form” before moving through ocean and light, “carrying the accumulated weight of the cycle before the wheel returns to winter.” Joel Ferree, of LACMA’s Art + Technology Lab, adds, “Part of ‘SPIRITS’ power lies in that it unfolds as a kind of clock, marking time through the movement of the sun.”