teamLab's 'Sauna Trance' in Tokyo pushes viewers into extreme heat and cold for bodily art experience

teamLab's latest experiential work in Tokyo, 'teamLab Reconnect', requires participants to wear swimsuits or loungewear while moving through seven different saunas with temperatures reaching 100°C. The installation aims to induce a trancelike state through sensory extremes, alternating between intense heat and icy showers. Specific sauna rooms include 'Underground River' with pine scent and 'Fire Red' where hōjicha tea creates a nutty aroma. After thermal cycles, visitors enter art rooms like 'Ephemeral Solidified Light' featuring laser-like water lines with dancing lights that participants can touch while wearing minimal clothing. A final room contains a floating sphere filled with unnamed gases that changes color as it moves through darkness. The exhibition claims to promote relaxation, creativity, and meditative states based on a study of 30 people, though the experience involves practical challenges with phones and towels. Running until 31 August in Roppongi, the work emphasizes physical awareness and communal observation of diverse bodies in shared spaces where masks are required outside sauna areas.