aquarium

Sky Aquarium

memoirsofaleishaLeave a comment

I recently went to the Art Aquarium in Nihonbashi, but yesterday (a public holiday) I went and checked out the Sky Aquarium which comes to town every summer (or at least it has done so over the last few years anyway). The Sky Aquarium is put on by the same guy as the other exhibition. It’s more a proper aquarium rather than an art exhibit. The Sky Aquarium is on level 52 of the Mori Tower building at Roppongi Hills. I liked the Art Aquarium better, but this was still really cool to see, and a great way to spend a hot humid afternoon. The first part of the exhibit was the Aquarium Theatre which was a large fish tank with changing slide projections and lights – a landscape of the four seasons. Spring:

From Sky Aquarium

Autumn:

From Sky Aquarium

Winter:

From Sky Aquarium
From Sky Aquarium

And then there was a series of various fish tanks will all sorts of fish.

From Sky Aquarium

This was some crazy sea slug:

From Sky Aquarium

Some cool fish effects on my camera – which were accidental. I couldn’t get the right settings on my SLR…but they turned out cool anyway.

From Sky Aquarium
From Sky Aquarium
From Sky Aquarium
From Sky Aquarium

These were some teeny tiny fishlets:

From Sky Aquarium

More fish in tanks. Don’t disturb. They’re in school!

From Sky Aquarium
From Sky Aquarium
From Sky Aquarium

Fish close-up. Nose dive!

From Sky Aquarium
From Sky Aquarium

The third part of the aquarium was the Oasis Planet which was the jellyfish area.

From Sky Aquarium
From Sky Aquarium

There were four cylinder open tanks with jellyfish. I was surprised they didn’t have lids on them. You could totally put your hand in them!

From Sky Aquarium
From Sky Aquarium

Jellyfish galore! Don’t get too close. They’re such spineless creatures!

From Sky Aquarium
From Sky Aquarium
From Sky Aquarium
From Sky Aquarium
From Sky Aquarium
From Sky Aquarium

These were some polka-dot jellyfish:

From Sky Aquarium
From Sky Aquarium
From Sky Aquarium
From Sky Aquarium
From Sky Aquarium
From Sky Aquarium

The centrepiece was a giant glass globe with fish inside.

From Sky Aquarium
From Sky Aquarium
From Sky Aquarium

The whole perimeter of the room was also outfitted with a shallow open fishtank.

From Sky Aquarium

This tank housed oopa loopas. I have no idea what these are. They’re a cross between a fish, a frog and a lizard. These were just bizarre. The first time I had ever seen them. I have no idea what they are called in English – but in Japanese they are ‘oopa loopa’.

From Sky Aquarium
From Sky Aquarium

I did an image search for them in Japanese, so you can get more of an idea of what they look like here. They’re a bit creepy. The Sky Aquarium is on until September 25th – open day and night. Entry is excellent value! 2000yen gives you access to the Sky Aquarium AND the Sky view observatory of the Mori Tower AND entry into the Mori Art Museum (MAM). Got to see a really great exhibition on there, after doing the aquarium. It was super impressive – all about architecture and the ‘Metabolism’ movement. It was superbly translated as well. It’s on until next year and worth checking out. So futuristic and creative, especially for a 60s movement.

Art Aquarium Part III

memoirsofaleishaLeave a comment

Because I know not of the art of restraint, here are more photos from the Art Aquarium. The final one, I promise! These are all pics which I took on the iPhone, and some turned out not too bad. Here are some freaky beady-eyed fish.

From Under water iPhone

And they glow in the dark too!

From Under water iPhone
From Under water iPhone
From Under water iPhone
From Under water iPhone

An interesting blower goldfish…

From Under water iPhone

Kaleidoscope aquarium:

From Under water iPhone
From Under water iPhone
From Under water iPhone
From Under water iPhone
From Under water iPhone
From Under water iPhone
From Under water iPhone

Happy 100th anniversary to the Nihonbashi bridge!

From Under water iPhone

I’m channeling fish energy. Need to swim like a fish tomorrow!

Aquarium Art: Part I (as seen through the SLR camera)

memoirsofaleisha1 Comment

Last night I caught up with Jeff. I had invited him to come see this really cool art installation/exhibition thing that I had wanted to check out. Today is the last day of the exhibition, so I had wanted to go see it over the weekend before it ended. Ahh, yes, art is fleeting. We met up last night in Nihonbashi where the exhibit was on at. The exhibition was so darn cool. Way cool. I’ll be blogging about it over three posts – taken over three different cameras. I took way too many photos! Today’s Part I are photos taken on the SLR. About a third of the way into the night, my battery died on the SLR. I hadn’t recharged it, so I had to use my iPhone camera and the pocket digital camera for the remainder of the night. So we finally arrived at the Coredo building in Nihonbashi at around 8.30pm-ish. The Coredo building:

From Aquarium Art

The building houses some really nice restaurants. It’s got some great design features in this building. Here were some of the walls and stuff.

From Aquarium Art
From Aquarium Art
From Aquarium Art
From Aquarium Art
From Aquarium Art

Super cool and stylish. So the exhibition I had wanted to check out was a thing called “Art Aquarium” which featured around goldfish. Lots and lots of goldfish. I wasn’t really sure what to expect. It was part goldfish aquarium, part art gallery, part nightclub, and part lounge/bar. If you go at night time – they turn it into a lounge/bar where you can drink beer and sparkling wine as you peruse the “exhibit”. I was not expecting a live DJ, strobe lights and thumping music – but there they were. But it was so super cool! We saw fish tanks of goldfish.

From Aquarium Art

It was dark inside except for some strobe lighting, and the lights within the fish tanks. The lights changed all the time throughout the whole exhibit, so you’d get all different colours reflecting from the fish.

From Aquarium Art
From Aquarium Art
From Aquarium Art

Taking good camera shots was somewhat challenging. You had to work with the glass tanks, the water, the moving fish and the changing lighting conditions – all in the dark!

From Aquarium Art

The exhibition centered purely around different species of goldfish…some of which are cross-bred to produce some fishy-looking goldfish. I found myself having to wait it out by each tank to wait for the lighting to change. Managed to capture a couple of good ones though.

From Aquarium Art

This was a freaky looking fish with a red bulge attached to the head. I don’t know much about fish…except for the fact that they taste good beer-battered with chips! Sorry Nemo!

From Aquarium Art
From Aquarium Art
From Aquarium Art
From Aquarium Art
From Aquarium Art
From Aquarium Art
From Aquarium Art

Lots of fish!

From Aquarium Art
From Aquarium Art

This was a bizarre-looking goldfish with some beady eyes!

From Aquarium Art
From Aquarium Art

Same fish, but different lighting. The lights would change every few seconds.

From Aquarium Art

Another fish under changing lights:

From Aquarium Art
From Aquarium Art

The first part of the exhibition was a series of small fish tanks built into and protruding from a wall.

From Aquarium Art
From Aquarium Art
From Aquarium Art

The Art Aquarium got even cooler as we made our way into the second part of the gallery. This was my favourite part and we spent sooo much time in here. It was like snapshot central in here. Everyone had cameras of all shapes and sizes. We were like goldfish paparrazzi. I kid you not! It opened out into a bar area with a live DJ, and giant diamond-shaped fish tanks!

From Aquarium Art
From Aquarium Art
From Aquarium Art

So cool. I love water and fish and aquariums. This was just so much fun! It was really mesmerizing. And the music was pumping too. Such a cool vibe.

From Aquarium Art

Everyone was going nuts with cameras! Jeff managed to capture a photo of a dude who was taking photos with his iPad. Hilarious! Taking photos on an iPad has got to be cumbersome. I always wondered if iPad owners ever actually used the camera feature on it!

From Aquarium Art

And the lights kept changing colours!

From Aquarium Art
From Aquarium Art
From Aquarium Art

There was a glass mirror panel, so I took a photo of the reflection:

From Aquarium Art

It had a real bar vibe, with drinks being served and people just chilling out listening to the music and watching the fish do their thing.

From Aquarium Art
From Aquarium Art
From Aquarium Art
From Aquarium Art
From Aquarium Art

I loved the shape of the fish tanks, as if they were also real massive diamonds being showcased! There were two diamond fishtanks – one housed small goldfish and the other had bigger goldfish.

From Aquarium Art
From Aquarium Art

I like this next shot of a girl gazing at the goldfish:

From Aquarium Art

The whole atmosphere was super cool!

From Aquarium Art
From Aquarium Art
From Aquarium Art
From Aquarium Art
From Aquarium Art

And then my favourite and the main showpiece was a giant fish bowl water fountain feature.

From Aquarium Art
From Aquarium Art
From Aquarium Art
From Aquarium Art
From Aquarium Art
From Aquarium Art
From Aquarium Art

I’m going to end it there for today. My SLR camera battery died at this point, and we were only halfway through the exhibit. I’ll continue on with the next installment taken on my other cameras later on in the week. Art Aquarium – super cool! A most excellent way to spend a Sunday night. I’ll post more info about it later on in the week. Entry: 1000yen. Totally worth it! Today (Monday Sep 12) is the last day it’s on. Get ye on down to Nihonbashi! It’s open until 11pm tonight.