Tate
About the Exhibition
Combining sculpture, performance, music, technology and social research, Hyundai Commission: Tarek Atoui: Hold creates environments where sound is experienced not only through the ears, but through the whole body. For his Hyundai Commission, he has transformed Tate Modern’s Turbine Hall into an immersive sonic landscape comprising custom-built wind instruments, percussion, electronics and sculptural objects, woven together to make an orchestra which connects the earth and sky. Through participation and performance, this living environment will constantly evolve throughout the run of the commission. Hyundai Commission: Tarek Atoui: Hold marks the eleventh annual Hyundai Commission and inaugurates the next decade of the partnership between Tate and Hyundai Motor, which will continue through 2036.
Atoui’s Hyundai Commission is the culmination of over two decades of experimentation, including collaborations with musicians, instrument-makers, engineers, and researchers across Asia and Europe. Drawing on these projects, he reimagines shengs, Korean drums, Uzbek horns, and custom-built electronic systems.
Hanging above the Turbine Hall ramp, a metal karnai (a ceremonial brass trumpet from Uzbekistan) is joined by two 3D-printed horns that echo and amplify the instrument’s elongated form. At the far end of the hall, drum skins, gongs, horns, stones and 20-meter long textiles are suspended among a network of bamboo and shengs (mouth organs from China and Southeast Asia), through which wind is channeled by a computer-controlled motor. In making the work, Atoui has responded to the extraordinary height, airflows and acoustic character of the Turbine Hall. Lithophone-like stones and warm lights invite visitors to sit, lie, gaze up, and attune themselves to the relationship between sound, materials, architecture, and bodies. Drawing on the artist’s memories of gathering places, from vine-covered canopies to sheltered courtyards, Hyundai Commission: Tarek Atoui: Hold situates the Turbine Hall as a site for encounter and exchange.
Microphones embedded within the installation sample the sounds produced by the instruments and the bustling backdrop of the Turbine Hall, with custom software reworking and playing them back as layers of the composition. Foregrounding the importance of improvisation in Atoui’s practice, these elements contribute to an ever-changing soundscape.
Throughout the six-month duration of the Hyundai Commission, the Turbine Hall will regularly become a site for live sound-based performances, where a network of musicians will ‘plug into’ Atoui’s installation as a sound system. The program will platform both local and international musicians—from instrumentalists to electronic artists, collectives and labels—highlighting the work of Atoui’s longstanding collaborators and fostering new connections.
About the Artist
Tarek Atoui (b.1980, Beirut, Lebanon) is a sound artist based in Paris, France. He received a BA in sound art and electro-acoustic music from the French National Conservatory of Reims, France in 1998. He has exhibited and presented performances at major institutions globally, including at TBA21 Thyssen-Bornemisza Art Contemporary, Madrid, Spain (2025); HangarBicocca, Milan, Italy (2025); S.M.A.K., Ghent, Belgium (2024); Museum of Contemporary Art, Sydney, Australia (2023); the Serralves Museum of Contemporary Art, Porto, Portugal (2022 and 2018); Bourse du Commerce - Pinault Collection, Paris, France (2021); Sharjah Art Foundation, Sharjah, UAE (2020); the 58th Venice Biennale, Italy (2019); Tate Modern, London (2016); Serpentine Gallery, London, UK (2012); and dOCUMENTA 13, Kassel, Germany (2012). His work is held in prestigious international collections, including the Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum, New York, USA; Saradar Collection, Beirut, Lebanon; Tate, London, UK; and the Pinault Collection, Paris, France. He was awarded the Suzanne Deal Booth / FLAG Art Foundation Prize in 2022.
About the Program
Hyundai Commission
The annual Hyundai Commission is a series of new, site-specific installations by international artists in Tate Modern’s iconic Turbine Hall. It is made possible by the long-term partnership between Tate and Hyundai Motor, now confirmed until 2036. The partnership was founded in 2014 with the longest initial commitment from a corporate partner in Tate’s history and encompasses support of both the Hyundai Commission and the Hyundai Tate Research Centre: Transnational. Attracting over 21.6 million visitors since it began, the Hyundai Commission gives artists the chance to interpret the vast industrial space of Tate Modern’s Turbine Hall, producing some of the most bold and memorable artworks of the past decade.
