Langlands & Bell have utilised laser technology to create an ethereal sphere suspended inside a block of optical crystal glass, a map of a world in transition described solely by the mass of air routes linking the world’s cities.

Commissioned by The Multiple Store in 2001, this extraordinary work has been produced in China using the finest quality glass and a unique process that combines advanced computer programming skills with the latest laser technology, first developed during the Cold War by Russia as part of its ‘Star Wars’ programme.

Langlands & Bell
www., 2001
Laser-etched crystal glass
10 x 10 x 10 cm
Edition: 100
Price: £1,500 +vat

Langlands & Bell (Ben Langlands and Nikki Bell) were shortlisted for the Turner Prize in 2004.

Their works are held by many of the international collections including the Arts Council, British Council, the Yale Center for British Art, the Saatchi Collection and the Tate Gallery.

Recent major exhibitions have included ‘Zardad’s Dog’ (Tate Britain 2005), Milton Keynes Gallery (2005) and Galerie Christian Nagel, Koln (2004). They were appointed as official British War Artists at the time of the invasion of Afghanistan in 2002 and they were nominated for the Turner Prize in 2004 for the resulting work ‘The House of Osama bin Laden’. Their major Paddington Basin Bridge commission opened in September 2004.

In their recent A Muse Um computer animation, acronyms are interspersed with photographs that Langlands & Bell have taken of the museums. Another major acronym work, Moving World (Night & Day) 2008, was installed in 2008 at the new Heathrow Terminal 5.

www.langlandsandbell.com