Largest spherical neon sculpture

The largest spherical neon sculpture is Hot Spot created by the British-Palestinian artist Mona Hatoum, with glassbending executed by the British artist Nick Malyon. The artwork which replicates the Earth using a globe-shaped metal frame with the major landmasses demarcated in vibrant red neon tubes is approximately 2.23 m (7 ft 4 in) in diameter (including the glass tubing). It was first exhibited at the White Cube Gallery in London, UK, in 2006.

Three more versions of Hot Spot have since been created. The artwork has also been exhibited at the Tate Modern in London, the Pompidou Centre in Paris, France, and the Fondazione Querini Stampalia Onlus in Venice, Italy, among other galleries. The title and stark red colouring conjure a sense of global emergency, with the artist wanting to draw attention to the inescapable interconnection between geopolitical conflicts and unrest around our planet.

Fine neon using 8-mm-diameter tubing is used in the artworks (by comparison, commercial neon signs typically use between 13 and 18-mm-gauge tubing), which serves to make the illumination brighter. Malyon estimates that it took him about five weeks to create the curved glass tubing for each Hot Spot sculpture.