Lets get physical.
Please Do Not Touch The Art is an exhibition featuring interactive installations by cross-disciplinary artists from UNSW Art and Design.
You are invited to touch, play, pluck, listen, scan, watch and grow at AirSpace Projects in Marrickville from the 22nd to the 25th of June.
Artist Profiles
Aston Creus
Broken Ranks, 2016, timber, Playstation thumbsticks, microcontroller, sensors, servos, programming. Image courtesy of the artist.
Broken Ranks is a kinetic sculpture that mimics the unseen choreographies of thumbsticks. By reacting to and following movements in space, the invisible forces controlling them shift between being potentially reminiscent of a gust of wind moving through space, and invisible thumbs keying motions into an imaginary video game.
Aston Creus is an emerging exhibiting artist based in Sydney, Australia. His artistic practice dances between the realms of interactive media, sculpture, installation, electronics, virtual reality and hardware hacking. Aston’s work often deals with the politics and nuances of communal digital spaces as well as human-computer intimacy on a physical, mundane level.
Jordan East
Vibrance, 2016, Arduino controlled EL Wire and projection, 2.7 x 2.7 x 3m. Image courtesy of the artist.
Vibrance is an audio-visual experience where the audience is invited to play and pluck the glowing neon tendrils, like an instrument from the future. Their actions echo from the strings to the projected imagery, engulfing the space in aural and visual vibrations.
Jordan is a Computer Science/Media Arts student with an interest in the creative side of technology, particularly video, animation, sound, music, and interaction design.
‘Sketch’ Hely
Technocrates, Digital System embedded in Analog Set Pieces
Inspired by the cognitive human condition, Technocrates (named after the greek philosopher, Socrates) is an interactive, cognitive-philosophy system where human-system interactions take place over the internet using an analog ‘QR’ code interface. Described by the artist as an abstract ‘self-reflective self-portrait’ of the modern human, Technocrates invites visitors motivated by curiosity to search their environment and themselves in an enigmatic adventure system designed to question the nature of identity, motivation and choice in personal decision making and problem solving.
The work attempts to defer focus away from the system by violating abstractions of reality with the aim of encouraging participants to reflect upon the personal research of choice. The aim of the work is to encourage discussion as to whether ‘freedom of choice’ exists as a timeless liberty, or if it is the intent of ‘who we perceive we are’ that defines the choices we have. Participants are on a search for their own motivations, pitted against modern constraints in order to survive, armed only with their intent, wits, empathy and curiosity.
Technocrates welcomes participants and suggests that, ‘While you are reading the end of this word, this sentence will request of you to ask yourself if you are normal and believe your identity as being uni-dimensional. Perhaps you could also consider, while there, whether you should ask yourself if you are guilty of motivations towards convincing others that, ‘I’m a good person’, or that ‘my struggles are greater’ or that ‘that person is ugly’? But why? Am I really the only one to weep for what I lack, grow angry from what I can’t control and become a shadow from what I fear? Aren’t I also worthy of your tenderness, empathy and resources? I struggle – like you, brother/sister. Time is indifferent to struggle and suffering. Reality infers that all people suffer, wearing many masks and obscuring many motivations in the company of others and themselves… This system aims to scrutinise true motivations in the search of who you are not. Within it you will believe you are many but actually this tale requires you only to be one: the question for those that know not themselves is, ‘Who are you?’
The interactive system requires users to have a device with a ‘QR-Code Reader/Scanner App’ (Free on Android or iPhone app marketplaces) and Internet access in order to engage with the system. A smartphone with a data plan will suffice.
‘Sketch’ is a 4th year undergraduate student attending UNSW who is currently studying a double Bachelors in Media Arts and Computer Science. During high school, he struggled with chronic feelings of anxiety, depression and self-loathing both at school and at home. Unable to address these issues at the time, he spent most of his education and many years afterwards on the internet and playing video games, which provided him with, not only the opportunity to experiment with who he thought he was, but also provided an escape from his responsibilities ‘IRL’. The games that he remembers the most fondly were: ‘Ragnarok Online’ and ‘World of Warcraft’ (both of which are Massively Multiplayer Online Role Play Games). The time invested inevitably led to a unremarkable result in the HSC as well as two years achieving an ‘almost worthless’ Diploma of IT in Games Development at TAFE.
Since starting his university degree four years ago, he has taught three classes of first year computing students as a course tutor in Algorithms at UNSW, conquered his depression, developed a passion for learning, been placed fourth with his university team in the national Cyber Security Challenge Australia (CySCA) and considers himself blessed to have people around who will give him the time of day.
He was recently described to be ‘eccentric’ by a guy he met at a pub after a corporate tech demo he attended as well as the lecturer in charge of this installation – which he’s not certain is a good or a bad thing…
‘It’s something, I suppose…’
Tara Pearson
You Decide, 2016, electronic push buttons, computer, timber framing, Arduino, programming, dimensions variable. Photo credit: Tara Pearson
You Decide investigates the direction you follow after making decisions. This artwork is influenced by ‘Choose Your Own Adventure’ books and with a narrative set inside the gallery space.
Tara Pearson is an artist concerned with audience participation. Her aim is to create art that asks the audience to touch it. She is influenced by her childhood of video games and procrastinating on the computer.
@taropea on instagram
Patrick Krzywicki
Snowglobe, June 2016, projector, accelerometer, and Graphics software. Photo credit: Patrick Krzywicki.
Using a singular physical controller, Snowglobe explores a user’s ability to interface and immerse themselves within a simulated environment and the lasting effects of doing so.
Patrick Krzywicki is a student presently studying Media Arts at UNSW, and has an active interest in the fields of Animation, Computer Science, and Interactive Media.
Patrick Younis
Aeolus and Me, 2016, Unity and Leap Motion, dimensions variable. Image courtesy of the artist.
Aeolus and Me is a virtual revitalisation of an ancient practice that involves altering a space or object to resonate with the wind. This process is referred to as Aeolian, after the Keeper of the Winds in Greek Mythos ‘Aeolus’, and accompanied sacred sites as a way to conduct nature through ritualistic activity. In recent centuries, an advancement in technology has meant that intentional kinetic involvement for the sake of ambience
or sound has been replaced with devices that simulate any sound it’s fed without architectural manipulation.
‘Aeolus and Me’ invites the audience to take a seat in the work and, using their hands, resurrect scattered pillars across the landscape to create their own ambient harmonies in virtual space.
Patrick Younis is a third year student, studying a Bachelor of Media Arts at UNSW Art and Design. His pursuit in digital media began with digitally painting landscapes, with heavy inspiration from artists like Daniel Dociu and Kekai Kotaki, but since then has crossed over to film, animation and sculpture. As a Cross-Media Artist, Patrick’s artistic interests involve tying the virtual and the physical together to produce interesting hybrids over multiple mediums. Growing up with video games and animation as the catalysts to his interest in art, immersion is at the forefront of his inspiration and practice.
AirSpace Projects 2014-2017 