Elaine Brechin: Windgrass
Artist(s):
Title:
- Windgrass
Exhibition:
Creation Year:
- 1998
Medium:
- Interactive Installation
Size:
- 20" x 18" x 18"
Category:
Keywords:
Artist Statement:
Windgrass explores the contrast between natural forces and computational processes, between human intimacy and technology that creates distance. Computational technology often leads us further away from the physical world, particularly when the interaction it supports is channeled through the narrow bandwidth provided by the keyboard, mouse, and screen. Windgrass seeks to address this problem by bringing more intimate physicality into the play between human and machine.
Lightly blowing across the surface of Windgrass sets off an undulating visual display on a field of 768 tiny incandescent lights. In addition, Windgrass amplifies the users’ soft blowing. This movement makes the object pull against its tether in the same way a dog pulls against its chain.
Windgrass evokes the emotional closeness we associate with our relationships to domestic animals. It suggests a domesticated piece of technology with a dependency on intimate human input. The user is compelled to bend down closer to the tethered object to interact with it in an intimate way. This recreates a sense of familiarity in the interaction the object requires.
