. . . Project One: Ad Totem
My first venture into melding time honored art practices with electronics was the ad totem concept. To make a shrine from automobile parts is an argument to convince consumer culture inundated with the ‘sense of self’ diminished by advertising, to step forward and gain ecological awareness. With audio and visual interactive components a viewer will be exposed to relationships between animals (historical totem icons), the environment and humans, touch on the distinctions between people, nature and the interdependencies that sum up identities. Symbolically, this metal totem will express preeminent and noble qualities to identify with as have totems poles historically. Using this same construct, must we accept that automobile manufacturers take pride in their logos and use their glistening chrome monikers to suggest who we are, something about our life style, and how we relate to the world around us as we drive through it? Because of this conceptual piece, I have taken the SF scavenger’s tour and intend to apply for a residency.
Within the car manufacturer’s logos on the totem pole, led and lcd screens will provide data ranging from green vehicle information from the Environmental Protection Agency web site to information about current fuel consumption and CO2 emissions for various car styles. At the rear of the totem pole aided by dashboard interfaces, consumers will be able to search the web for information about their car, cars of interest and other information such as car costs (initial investment and estimated repairs over a five year span will be broken down to dollars and cents per mile).
In addition, sites such as Mercedes’ Cedy’s World will be shown at random- a site for children that promulgates the notion of advertising to the youngest of customers before they can even drive, will be available.
Sculpture Construction & Features:
Totem will be a kinetic sustainable energy sculpture that harnesses power from the wind, sun and rain to then recycle the natural resources for the benefit of interactive participants by providing cleaner air and power for the on-board computer and communication systems. Solar and wind energy will be stored to ion-lithium batteries.The car logos that make up the facade of the piece are to be constructed using recycled auto-body parts specific to each individual logo (Ford parts for the Ford logo, Toyota for the Toyota logo, etc.). Dashboards from various cars will be altered to interface with websites for information gathering using Bluetooth/cel-phone technology. The dashboards will be situated in the rear of the piece in a convex area that mimics Northwestern cedar native totem poles that are carved out to help dry the wood and keep it from checking and splitting. In this area a small environment will shield participants from surrounding noise and fumes and providing clean air manufactured by the sculpture’s ionic air purifier. A small electric motor will be in the base of the sculpture to generate power for moving the piece, aiding the solar cells to track the sun, supply the air purifier with power, to collect and dispense rain water for cooling the surrounding air, and power the display screens.
RFID chips that are embedded in a driver’s key fob will provide the avenue for customized information dissemination to participants either in passing cars or to those standing near by. This information can in fact provide not only the name of the owner of the key fob but information about the age of his/her car and thus will allow personalized information to be displayed such as estimated repairs coupled with the initial investment to proivde the cost of the vehicle in dollars and cents per mile. Roughly 40 million Americans carry some form of a RFID device which can display information pertinent to an individual. This information gathering would be fairly easy yet most likely disconcerting to many.
In addition, the LED screens will responds to changes the ambient radio frequency environment to detect the presence of mobile phones and pagers. These changes will become visual patterns on the screen. Radio frequency waves are also passing through our bodies thus raise the question of the effects they have on us...
Totem Poles:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Totem_pole
http://www.native-languages.org/totem.htm
http://users.imag.net/~sry.jkramer/nativetotems/
Automobile Information:
History and Design of Car Logos
http://www.dinesh.com/History_of_Logos/Car_Logos_-_Design_and_History/Fuel Consumption and CO2 emissions:
http://www.bmw.com/com/en/index_low.htmlGreen Car Sites:
http://www.treehugger.com/files/2006/11/how_to_green_your_car.php
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/technology/4930794.stm
http://groovygreen.com/groove/?p=244
http://greencar.us/category/fuel-cell-cars/
http://www.landrover.com/experien/en/Experience/Home.htmEnvironmental Protection Agency Green Vehicle Guide:
http://www.epa.gov/greenvehicle/Funding:
SF Scavenger Artist in Residence:
http://www.sunsetscavenger.com/AIR/apply.htm
Peninsula Community Foundation:
www.pcf.org/community_grants/recent_grants.html
Silicon Valley Community Foundation:
http://www.siliconvalleycf.org/grants_DCtoMV_artsGrants.htmlTechnology:
Ion-lithium cell batteries:
http://www.qinetiq.com/home/case_studies/energy/lithium_ion_battery_technology.htmlhttp://www.popularmechanics.com/technology/upgrade/4204202.html
http://www.totexusa.com/Air Purifying Technology:
http://www.cleanair4life.com/technology.html http://www.ultraviolet.com/
http://www.sharperimage.com/us/en/landpage/proplus.jhtml?cm_ven=overture&cm_cat=Media&cm_pla=air+purifiers&cm_ite=clean_air_machinRadio Frequency Identification (RFID) tags:
http://zebra.com/id/zebra/na/en/index/rfid/white_papers.html?WT.srch=1
http://www.eurekalert.org/pub_releases/2005-01/jhu-rci012905.php
http://www.schneier.com/blog/archives/2005/10/rfid_car_keys.html
http://www.technologyreview.com/Infotech/13902/Liquid Crystal Displays:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Liquid_crystal_display
http://www.howstuffworks.com/lcd.htm
http://store.earthlcd.com/LED Manufacturers:
http://www.cree.com/products/ledManufact.asphttp://www.superbrightleds.com/other.htm
http://electronics.howstuffworks.com/led.htm
http://ledmuseum.home.att.net/ledleft.htm
http://www.instructables.com/id/E5W4M8U0LOEV2Z9R9A/Materials:
Simms Metal Recycling
Pick-N-Pull Self Service Auto Recycler
www.picknpull.com
http://www.scrap-sf.org/Children as Consumers, Mercedes for Children
. . . Project One.Five Talking Fresco Heads
For the past year I have been working on 3D fresco-portraits. These pieces have been about building on historicism of materials pushed beyond their capabilities. One of my first considerations when I signed up for the Art 511 class was to incorporate a lcd screen, speakers, a small projection system to cast words and phrases on the floor or surrounding walls via an internet connection thus rendering real-time photos, drawings, phrases & readings about the persona of the portrait. I now need to order a Ben Rubin and a Mark Hansen to complete this project since I have ten idle portraits and electronic components sitting in my home waiting for their virtual voices and imagery.Example: a Virginia Woolf portrait would emit a voice using a synthetic voice synthesizer current Internet searches on her poems, novels, bio etc. as well as show images.
The information would then be stored and then re-imaged (photos) should nothing be available on the net.
Concerns:
Appropriate and small inconspicuous storage (hard drive and software to access net)
LED or LCD incorporation into the body of the sculptureThe following links touch on the technical learning process for this project.
http://www.mobileviewscreens.com/modular-led-screens.html
