Amodal Suspension

Amodal Suspension is a large-scale interactive installation where people can send short text messages to each other using a cell phone or web browser. However, rather than being sent directly, the messages are encoded as unique sequences of flashes with twenty robotically-controlled searchlights, not unlike the patterns that make up Morse code. Messages "bounce" around from searchlight to searchlight, turning the sky into a giant switchboard. A message may be "caught" with a cell phone or a 3D internet interface, at which time it is removed from the sky, shown on the cell phone or online interface and projected on the façade of the museum.

This work was inspired by the Tanabata tradition in Japan, whereby short messages are ritually hung on bamboo. One objective of the piece was to make a public spectacle by using the private medium of text messaging, slowing down communication and introducing the possibility of interception.

Amodal Suspension was commissioned fir the opening of the Yamaguchi Centre of Art and Media (YCAM) in Japan. The piece was active between the 1st and the 24th of November 2003.

Category:

Film & Animation

Tags:

• interactive
• multimedia
• art
• installation
• rafael
• lozano-hemmer
• media
• amodal
• suspension
• YCAM
• searchlight