10 highlights from touring Area15’s massive art collection

It makes you stop in your tracks, the vintage World War II Jeep with glowing chassis bursting from a wooden shipping crate. But why is it here? And what does it mean?

A robotic female voice supplies the answers into our earbuds as we stroll the Area15 grounds, pausing at Cargo Cult, the art installation piece in question.

“Cargo Cult reframes a military workhorse as contemporary narrative,” she explains. “Historical utility transformed into present spectacle.”

Got it.

We’re about an hour into Art Quest, the new self-guided audio tour at Area15, a trek through the property’s voluminous art collection, which includes nearly 50 sculptures and 30 murals spread across its 40-acre campus.

The experience is divided into three sections — Art Island/Zone 1, the Main Bunker interior and Zone 2 — and is narrated by the aforementioned bot, Aria-15, and “feelings guy” Tom, who doubles as a geyser of colorful quotes.

Visitors access the tour on a web-based app at area15.com, choosing among three options: an in-depth experience, a lighter, more abbreviated commentary, or a playful version for kids.

With a whopping 48 pieces featured in the tour, there’s close to two hours’ worth of art to digest as guests learn the stories behind old favorites and new additions alike.

Ten highlights from our trip:

Section 1

Dream Portal

By Davis McCarty, located at Art Island

What it looks like: Seemingly designed to re-create the sensation of getting drop-kicked by a rainbow, this translucent archway is as colorful as peacock plummage spun into giant shards of iridescent glass.

The story: A fittingly fantastical entryway onto the Area15 grounds, this towering threshold heralds a whole lot of visual stimuli.

Tom’s take: “It reorients perception of scale and color.”

Mechan 9

By Tyler Fuqua, located at Art Island

What it looks like: A colossal, 40-foot-wide robot that could pass for the Iron Giant’s distant cousin, splayed on its back as if making snow angels.

The story: The first of three Fuqua robot creations flanking the property and one of numerous pieces here that first appeared at Burning Man, “Mecha 9” is also featured in the Bot Breach VR-experience in The Lab on Area 15’s second floor.

Tom’s take: “Fuqua says he hopes children see this and realize they too can build worlds.”

Emergence

By Michael Benistry, located outside Area15’s entryway, adjacent to the west parking lot

What it looks like: A gleaming vertical slab with a female form emerging from its rippling depths, looking as if she were made of the same silvery goop as the killer T-1000 cyborg in “Terminator 2.”

The story: Belgian sculptor Benistry uses his mirror-polished, stainless steel works to explore themes of unity, love and human connection. Gaze into its reflective contours and see who’s looking back.

Tom’s take: “The contrast between the smooth central body and the chaotic textured backdrop symbolizes transformation, breakthrough, and the moment of becoming.”

Section 2

Shogyo Mujo

By Bart Kresa Studio and Josh Harker, located just inside Area15’s front doors

What it looks like: This 12-foot, projection-mapped, geometric skull is the first thing you see upon entering Area15 and one of the last things you’re likely to forget after visiting here. With its 3D-printed panels swarming with imagery ranging from the celestial to the geometric to the Día de Muertos-inspired, it’s a harbinger of things to come inside these kaleidoscopic walls.

The story: Another Burning Man vet, Shogyo Mujo was also featured at Life is Beautiful before coming to Area15, where it’s become a visual totem of the property.

Tom’s take: “A cathedral of engineered light and a contemporary memento mori condensed into one object.”

Infinity Temple 4.0

By Rhoades Glass, located near the Oddwood bar

What it looks like: Sure, your mother may have taught you that it’s not polite to stare, but — with all due to respect to moms — what did she know about luminous, boulder-sized hexecontahedrons? Once you peer into its seemingly endless mirrored depths, your pupils start to feel like magnets pressed against a refrigerator door.

The story: Over 5,000 LEDs line the inner faces of the 60-sided piece, with one-way mirrors creating what feels like a bottomless chasm for the senses to plunge down forevermore.

Tom’s take: “It operates beyond spectacle; symmetry, light and repetition create a meditative and at times spiritual encounter.”

Untitled

By Jessie Unterhalter and Katey Truhn, along a wall near Omega Mart

What it looks like: A spatial puzzle to be solved — or gawked at with mouth agape. This UV-reactive mural swirls with abstract shapes while glowing like a mammoth black light poster.

The story: The core themes here are movement, symmetry, contrast and perception. An Aria-15 recommendation: Take 10 slow steps while tracking a single curve to observe a perceptual shift.

Tom’s take: “This work is a technicolor nudge toward wonder.”

Section 3

Alpha Victoria

By Made on Mars, located at the Art Garden

What it looks like: A steampunk Pegasus with jet fin wings and glowing eyes, ready to leap onto the cover of the sweetest ’80s metal album never released.

The story: Constructed of repurposed industrial materials, the piece blends myth with machinery.

Tom’s take: “It is as if a thunderbolt struck a legend and welded it in place.”

Echo Grove

By Freeform, located in the Art Garden

What it looks like: A metallic tree with surveillance-camera branches, or perhaps the home security system of the most paranoid of androids. Either way, you’re being watched.

The story: Smile — or shudder — you’re on camera at “Echo Grove,” which was conceived as a riff on the modern-day notion that we’re always being watched somehow. This one is equal parts prank and protest.

Tom’s take: “Feels like The Force is judging my vacation photos. Also, who knew trees could do CCTV cosplay?”

747

By Ken Feldman, located in the Art Garden

What it looks like: It’s hard not to be awestruck standing beneath this 150-foot-long, 60-foot-wide Boeing 747, where imaginations prepare for take-off. Chill in the airline seats below and let this big ol’ jet airliner carry you too far away.

The story: Before crash-landing in Vegas, 747 debuted at Burning Man in 2016 as the fest’s largest mobile art car. It has since been refitted with lounges and performance spaces. Buckle up.

Tom’s take: “It feels like time paused midlanding. Beneath that tilted nose, one registers goose bumps and a quick, almost reflexive urge to duck.”

Armoured Ascension

By Cee8 Studios, located outside the Area15 parking garage

What it looks like: Two Humvees dipped into a massive vat of melted crayons and then stacked on top of one another in a layer cake of metallic decadence.

The story: Inspired by Texas’ iconic automotive art installation piece Cadillac Ranch, “Armored Ascension” recontextualizes military vehicles, normally evocative of conflict, into something grand and beautiful.

Tom’s take: “It makes the desert feel like it went to charm school.”

Contact Jason Bracelin at jbracelin@reviewjournal.com or 702-383-0476. Follow @jasonbracelin76 on Instagram.