Members (and Twitter users) only

As part of my application for the current Artspace Research Commission, I was asked to consider how I “would share the project/involve others via social media etc”.

Beyond Flickr and Vimeo etc I don’t really use any social media platforms, but the prompt (and the expectations wrapped up within it) got me thinking: what if the building did the tweeting? What interesting questions might that highlight.

Table monkey

The table monitor. And a monkey.

So, for the last couple of days I’ve been wiring different sensors into a room at Artspace that is, I understand, usually kept as a space reserved for the studio members (think staff room crossed with meeting room crossed with common room).

That private space is now publishing messages to Twitter whenever the photocopier lid is lifted, the kettle boiled or the table clunked. As I type, my glamorous assistant Reece is working away on one of our other interactive devices, so the table monitor is being triggered quite a lot!

See @ArtspaceMonitor for the feed.

Objects updating status messages onto the Twitter platform is by no means a new idea and the occurrences I’m logging are not particularly dramatic, but I think it raises some interesting points for discussion. (Like when Reece goes to lunch!)

Kettle corner

The kettle corner, with additional electronic items

brew monitor

The brew monitor

The pool of message texts it selects from are not very extensive, so it’ll be interesting to see how followers of the account respond to the inevitable repetition.

It was also very interesting to sit down and try to imagine what voice the room would use and how it might perceive the activities taking place. What I really needed there was a team of 4-year-olds on the case, as I’m sure they would have found the task a lot easier!

Anyway, we have a demonstration up and working and you’re invited to have a glimpse at the things going on within the Members’ Room. Here on the inside we’ll be watching carefully to see if people end up changing their behaviour once they know echoes of it are being heard outside the walls…

Again, the Twitter stream is at @ArtspaceMonitor.

router corner

Ethernet shield sitting in the corner taking care of things

Seeking out Artspace’s non spaces

So, first job with the Artspace residency was to have a good ol’ look at the building and seek out the spaces that have potential.

For me this turned out to mean seeking out the non spaces. Also the liminal spaces between more obvious locations.

Here are some of the places that caught my eye:

From these (or maybe some others) I’ve shortlisted the sites I’d like to work with and identified the sorts of questions I’d like to ask through the devices I’ll be making. (Sorry, can’t tell you too much or it wouldn’t be a surprise, would it?!)

I’ve ordered motion sensors, sonar range finders, an ethernet shield and various other goodies. Hoping tomorrow will be a Good Post Day.

On Monday we start making.

Upcoming residency at Coventry Artspace

Next week I’ll be based at Coventry Artspace as the recipient of one of their 5 Artspace Research Commissions (ARC).

I’m HIJACK; tasked with making architectural interventions in the Artspace building, hijacking its usual purposes to create an unusual find for a public event.

Artspace

My unusual finds will be in the form of small interactive interventions. Using a variety of sensors such as proximity, motion, heat and humidity sensors, mechanisms will move, shake, rattle, roll, reveal, hide, strike, ping, scrape, dangle and waft as people move into their awareness.

In the best of research traditions, we don’t know what will come out of this work, but we’re curious to find out.

My proposal is based around the Heritage Open Day weekend coming up on the 8th and 9th of September and the question “how does it flip our assumptions for Heritage Open Days if, rather than people going to look at the building, the building is looking at the people?”

Now I’ve had a chance to delve a little deeper, it might perhaps be more accurate to say the residency will aim to instigate conversations responding to the next wave of questions that arise after you ask the one above.

  • Should the devices be integral – of the existing structure – or superficial – new additions placed onto surfaces?
  • Does the building communicate with us?
  • If so, about what? In what sort of voice?
  • Can we affect the flows of people around the building?
  • Would we want to make people uncomfortable?
  • If so, how uncomfortable would we be comfortable making them?
  • What might the devices reveal about the building …or about the people?

The Artspace building has a rich history to draw from, but time is limited, so it’ll be interesting to find out which of its many stories bubble up to the surface in that time.

I’m also curious to find out what the research reveals of me and my practice.

Back in July I attended the Interactive Architecture day at MADE. I went into it thinking “yeah, spaces and sensors and that: this is totally what I do”, but soon found out I was really struggling with the shift from putting the tech on the people to putting the tech on the architecture.

Here’s where I start to question what I want from interactive architecture.

If you’d like to see how far I’ve managed to explore in a week, please do come along on either Saturday 8th and Sunday 9th September between 11am and 4pm to find out.

It’s free, there are other tours and stuff happening as well, and we’ve already decided we don’t want to make people too uncomfortable. Probably…

Coventry Artspace, 16 Lower Holyhead Road, Coventry, CV1 3AU [map]



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