Vessels: Transflux exhibition: YBCA
Vessels can carry oxygen as blood or act as a container for liquid. In a more spiritual sense, a vessel can be a person regarded as a holder or receiver of something.
In Vessels, water is used to visually and sonically represent biometric data. The visitor’s heart rate is measured by reading blood density in the fingertip, and transposed into a liquid sequence which travels through a tube in the gallery. This sequence ends as drops onto a resonant steel drum, translating the sequence into sound. The water is collected in a reservoir for recirculation through the system.
The visitors see their heart rates visualized in front of them, and can watch the patterns of their hearts as the sequences travel through the tube. This allows for time to reflect on their influences on these rhythms and how these sequences may change with changes in their emotional states.
The collection reservoir acts as a watering hole where viewers can gather and watch the droplets fall and collect.
Vessels was created by Pelham Johnston and eve Warnock
Transflux exhibition, Yerba Buena Center for the Arts.
Transflux, the multi-media interactive exhibition artists Gene A. Felice II, Nathaniel Ober, and Eve Warnock explores the themes of biomimicry and interconnectedness between inner worlds and outer worlds, between the largest (cosmos) and smallest (microcosms) realms known to humans. From bios, meaning “life,” and mimesis, meaning “to imitate,” biomimicry serves as a powerful tool for inspiring sustainable solutions to modern dilemmas by emulating nature’s time-tested patterns and symbiotic strategies. Hybridizing the wisdom of plants, animals, and microbes with findings from disciplines like astrophysics, engineering, sociology, genomics, and cellular biology, the Transflux installations convey “living technologies” all within an ecologically-minded framework.
Contributing Artists: Pelham Johnston, David Kant, Tina Matthews, Dan Mayer, Sean Pace, Darrell Ruppel, James Shedel, Leslie Thompson, Wade Warman, Kate Spacek
http://www.ybca.org/transflux#