UCLA (Fall 2003)

Graduate Seminar (Prof. Jennifer Steinkamp)

This proposal is an interactive robotic art installation which works with the distance between visitor and the piece.

Inspired by the movie Bus 174 where passengers of a hijacked bus communicated by writing on the windows while the world witnessed the tragedy, this piece starts a dialoge with the visitor on the window surface.

By writing and drawing on the outside of the window with a lipstick the 3 screens suspended from the ceiling are moving up and down, looking for information. On the screens little webcams are mounted looking from the inside outside at the visitors. The camera is both directly connected to the screen.

Also the screens are "equipped with" a lipstic to draw. Whenever the robotic screen "sees" a line it will draw around it, and I'm hoping to create a visual dialogue between inside and outside. Like a creature living in a zoo, I'm also hoping to give these robotic devices some kind of personality.

(Depending on technical complecity and time this piece could potentially also be a telematic piece, broadcasting the camera image on the internet and giving useres there the opportunity to control ths robotic devices.)

This proposal is a sound installation controlled by a camera looking from the inside to the ouside at the visitors.

The spacial situation of of the window creates a frame holdidng 24 speakers like a spidernet.

The camera is tracking the outline of the visitor(s) standing in front of the window or passing by. A computer system controlls the speakers that way that only those speakers are activated which are spacially withing this outline.

Inspired by current research where blind people can supposedly see using sound I'm hoping to create a sound pattern which communicates with the visitor on the invisible realm.