In the first segment of this two-part exhibition—geared to probe the relationship between technology and the human senses—I. M. Pei’s generously mutable architecture and Bill Arning, Jane Farver, Yuko Hasegawa, and Marjory Jacobson’s gift for scaled-up institutional curation combine for a spectacular installation, even if one or two of the pieces come out a bit wonky. In a large, dark room extensively kit out with speakers, a booming “opera” of music and effects gives powerful, convincing texture to Janet Cardiff and George Bures Miller’s human-scaled diorama in the center: a dusty shack swinging with light bulbs, piled high with records and their players. It is a familiar tableau, the kind of safe, still space frequented by the likes of Mark Dion, yet here the setup comes heart-racingly alive. Elsewhere, Sissel Tolaas’s experiment in olfactory science promises to release a scent to viewers who touch portions of the wall. (Alternatively, the smells are available from small spritzers on a nearby shelf.) The piece is convoluted, silly, and screams of a miscue, but its sci-fi grandeur pays off once you see groups of gallerygoers begin to rub and caress the MIT walls. Bruce Nauman’s Office Edit I, 11/11/00, 11/9/00, 11/16/00, 11/19/00, Mapping the Studio (Fat Chance John Cage), 2001, an infrared surveillance video of the artist’s studio at night, takes on looming gravitas when projected, at substantial dimensions, into a thirty-square-foot room, the neatest instance of this satisfying show adjusting organically to its thesis.

— William Pym