Projects: Metamorphosis
As our technologies become smaller, cheaper, disposable and 'ubiquitous' how is our environment altered by our technologies? Metamorphosis looked to provoke such questions.
I was commissioned as an Artist in Residence by the Friends Programme at Lancaster University to create the inaugural content for the e-Campus Underpass project at Lancaster University. The e-Campus project looked to create a unique infrastructure of numerous interactive displays across a university campus and I was appointed as co-Manager of one of the branches of the e-Campus project, the Underpass – a multi-projector display in the university underpass (a bus stop). We called the exhibition Metamorphosis.
What set the exhibition apart from other installations was that the experience was entirely controlled by the flow of traffic in the underpass. Multiple hidden sensors scattered around the underpass registered any movement in the exhibition space sending coded messages to the audio-visual equipment. For example if a vehicle approached the butterfly projected across the screen, the butterfly would appear to become afraid and fly back into its chrysalis.
Metamorphosis looked not only to enrich urban life beyond simple entertainment but also to involve collaboration between university students and youths from a housing project; artists and computer scientists; nature and technology. To do so, I collaborated with Tom Lloyd, Dan Fox and Hannah Lloyd from (the former) Welfare State International and then worked with my own group (now BigDog Interactive). Together we worked with students from Theatre Studies at Lancaster University (with Matt Fenton, Nuffield Theatre), youths from a housing project in Morecambe (lead by Mari) and the e-Campus staff. Metamorphosis involved a month-long exhibition at the Lanternhouse in Cumbria, three participatory workshops and an Opening Night performance party in the Lancaster University underpass.
For the initial exhibition, BigDog Interactive collaborated with Welfare State International artists. The Cruck Barn at the Lanternhouse in Cumbria was transformed. A screen completely filled one wall of the blacked-out barn, showing video images of coppiced oaks, the woodland floor carpeted with bluebells. Up and down the beams of the barn, hundreds of paper butterflies fluttered in the breeze. Visitors could sit and watch the woods, and listen to the bird song, but those who moved around the space triggered less peaceful sounds and images. The exhibition took the form of a large audio-visual installation - an animated film of a butterfly emerging from a chrysalis was projected across three large screens and was accompanied by a bespoke sound track. Multiple hidden sensors scattered around the room registered any movement in the exhibition space and if a person approached the butterfly projected across the screen, the butterfly would appear to become afraid and fly back into its chrysalis. To add to the ambience, the room is filled with handmade butterflies which flutter as carefully placed fans oscillate back and forth.
Following the exhibition, the installation moved to the underpass at Lancaster University, a multi-screen display at a bus stop. Leading up to the opening night, several workshops took place at the Nuffield Theatre and in the Music Department. The intention of the workshops was to allow students to understand how to create their own content for the underpass as well as to provide a positive model for youths who may not be attending the university to interact with students at the university. Three workshops took place: Max/MSP workshop – to allow students to understand the technology behind the multi-screen displays; Guerilla Graffiti which saw student creating eco-friendly graffiti on campus with sieves and flour; and, Chimes in which students collaboratively built chimes with people on campus which they could then take back to their dorms.
The opening exhibition took place in the underpass at Lancaster University and involved collaboration with BigDog Interactive, Welfare State International, Lancaster University Computing Department, students from Theatre Studies at Lancaster University, youth residents from the Morecambe Youth Housing centre, a live street band, bike riding, stilt walking, among others. Food and refreshments were served from a city bus. The event was free and open to the public.
People Involved
Welfare State International: Tom Lloyd, Dan Fox, Hannah Fox, Jodie Pogel, Taissa
BigDog Interactive: Stewart Kember and Peter Phillips
Morecambe Youth Housing: Especially Mari
Nuffield Theatre: Matt Fenton
Music Department, Lancaster University: Neil Boynton
Computing Department, Lancaster University: Gordon Blair & e-Campus committee
The Street Band
The Butterfly
Stagecoach, Lancaster and Morecambe
Exhibitions
e-Campus, Lancaster University, Lancaster UK, on-going demonstrator.
Underpass, 15 October -15 November 2005, Lancaster University, Lancaster UK.
Underpass Party, 15 October 2005, Lancaster University, Lancaster UK.
Lanternhouse, 1-31 July 2005, Ulverston UK.
Press
| 2005, November | LU News. “Campus communications”, Lancaster University. |
| 2005, Oct. 21 | “Butterfly flutters by in university underpass”, Paul Collins, The Guardian Series, Lancashire. |
| 2005, October | LU News. “Buses and Butterflies”, Lancaster University. |
| 2005, Sept. 15 | BBC Radio Lancashire. “The underpass, Metamorphosis and the Opening Night”, Radio Interview. |
| 2005 July | BBC Radio Cumbria. “Metamorphosis” Ulverston, Cumbria |
| 2005 July | LU News. “Interactive Art”, Lancaster University. |
Acknowledgements
Metamorphosis was made possible by:
- The Friends Programme at Lancaster University
- Welfare State International
- EQUATOR. Equator IRC - GR/N15986/01 - "Technological Innovation in Physical and Digital Life".