HouseSwarming
Commissioned for the Art Center presentation of “Open House,” this site-specific installation operates both as a complex light pattern that greets visitors and as an environment-sensing device.
During the day, the "swarm" of green ambiguous forms, both biomorphic and geometric, accentuates the South Campus’s main entry. At twilight, the swarm comes to life, telling visitors and passersby about the current air quality around the building. Electronic sensors perceive air contaminants – such as tobacco, benzene, arecarbon monoxide, even perfume – and separately inform the outside and inside swarms, which sets off signals.
These signals are interpreted as changes to the natural rhythm that the network has established based on the number and distribution of nodes connected to the cable net. Flashing cells on the exterior facade indicate air quality inside the building. Conversely, pulsating effects in the interior entry inform visitors about the outside air quality. The flashing lights become indicators of the environment like dramatic clouds at sunset that forewarnings of storms at night.
HouseSwarming is an example of how architects and designers are using technology that mimics biological systems. These patterns look like those structures found in nature, such as the patterns made by schools of fish, flocks of birds, and swarms of locusts. Used in the home, this type of sensor-node technology could enable us to extend our nervous system into the environment and alter our sense of boundaries.
HouseSwarming is part of the OPEN HOUSE exhibition:
http://www.artcenter.edu/openhouse/
Art Center Wind Tunnel
950 S. Raymond Avenue
Pasadena, CA 91105
626.396.2319
M&A EVENTS at the WIND TUNNEL:
Several M&A sponsored events will be held at the Wind Tunnel over the summer - check here as the program schedule develops:
http://www.artcenter.edu/openhouse/programs/openhouse_programs.html
or visit
http://www.materialsandapplications.org
The first M&A program of the summer is co-curated by M&A
and BLDGBLOG (http://bldgblog.blogspot.com):
