**Excerpt from my Masters Journal Jan 2011**
An important example in the development of telepresent art is Gene Coopers Thundervolt, 1994, where real time recordings of lightning strikes in the United States were relayed to a central computer that was, in turn, wired to Coopers body. Once registered, the strikes were translated into electrical signals that caused muscles in his body to twitch.
Masaki Fujihata’s Light on the Net, 1996, is another significant telepresent art work. In this piece a grid-like web interface represents forty-nine light bulbs in the lobby of the Gifu Softopia Center, Japan. Viewers on the web can click the bulbs to turn the physical light on/off.
In 1997, Austro-Hungarian artist collective Association Creation developed Bump, where two footbridges were connected - one in Linz and the second in Budapest. When a person stepped onto the bridge in Linz, the corresponding board on the bridge in Budapest would rise and vice versa.
Nancy Patterson’s Stockmarket Skirt, 1998, is a telepresent media work that utilizes a webcam to capture and display real-time images of a skirt which raises its hemline according to fluctuations in the stock market. Stockmarket Skirt partakes in the myth that skirt length is an economic indicator - the better the economy, the shorter the skirt.
Above the sky in Mexico City, Rafael Lozano-Hemmers Vectorial Elevation, 1999/2000 enables viewers to control lights and influence the patterns that they create above the Central Square. This artwork effectively bridges the gap between the very public space of the town square and the public domain of the internet.
Another telepresent work that bridges the public spaces of the internet and physical places is Eduardo Kac’s series of installations titled Ornitorrinco. The structure of this work is fashioned by a wireless telerobot, telephone lines and remote/physical spaces. The viewers become participants as they navigate the distant environment by pressing the buttons on a telephone’s numeric keypad. The remote spaces in the Ornitorrinco series were always built to the scale of the robot, a process that Kac says “invited viewers to abandon the human scale temporarily and to look at a new world from a perspective other than their own”
Many of these examples make use of the internet, but it is important to note that the web did not herald the advent of telepresence, though its use was demonstrated by artists such as Ken Goldberg, Eric Paulos, and Eduardo Kac of how to exploit the internet within a more expansive context and engage a greater number of participants. For me, however, the significance of the internet in telepresent art relates not only to the interface which allows control by a remote agency, but also references the philosophies of Thomas Hobbes in his book Leviathan (1651) on a single, self-organising system and artificial intelligence. The interesting point to note about artworks such as Masaki Fujihata’s Light on the Net and Rafael Lozano-Hemmers Vectorial Elevation, is not just about enabling individuals to control robots in remote places, but more about Hobbes’ therories - taking the result of the individuals actions and considering them as one. If we were to ignore the fact that telerobots are controlled by separate clients sitting at workstations in various locations across the globe, then we could perhaps suggest that such robots are controlled solely by one sovereign intelligence - the internet.
An important example in the development of telepresent art is Gene Coopers Thundervolt, 1994, where real time recordings of lightning strikes in the United States were relayed to a central computer that was, in turn, wired to Coopers body. Once registered, the strikes were translated into electrical signals that caused muscles in his body to twitch.
Masaki Fujihata’s Light on the Net, 1996, is another significant telepresent art work. In this piece a grid-like web interface represents forty-nine light bulbs in the lobby of the Gifu Softopia Center, Japan. Viewers on the web can click the bulbs to turn the physical light on/off.
In 1997, Austro-Hungarian artist collective Association Creation developed Bump, where two footbridges were connected - one in Linz and the second in Budapest. When a person stepped onto the bridge in Linz, the corresponding board on the bridge in Budapest would rise and vice versa.
Nancy Patterson’s Stockmarket Skirt, 1998, is a telepresent media work that utilizes a webcam to capture and display real-time images of a skirt which raises its hemline according to fluctuations in the stock market. Stockmarket Skirt partakes in the myth that skirt length is an economic indicator - the better the economy, the shorter the skirt.
Above the sky in Mexico City, Rafael Lozano-Hemmers Vectorial Elevation, 1999/2000 enables viewers to control lights and influence the patterns that they create above the Central Square. This artwork effectively bridges the gap between the very public space of the town square and the public domain of the internet.
Another telepresent work that bridges the public spaces of the internet and physical places is Eduardo Kac’s series of installations titled Ornitorrinco. The structure of this work is fashioned by a wireless telerobot, telephone lines and remote/physical spaces. The viewers become participants as they navigate the distant environment by pressing the buttons on a telephone’s numeric keypad. The remote spaces in the Ornitorrinco series were always built to the scale of the robot, a process that Kac says “invited viewers to abandon the human scale temporarily and to look at a new world from a perspective other than their own”
Many of these examples make use of the internet, but it is important to note that the web did not herald the advent of telepresence, though its use was demonstrated by artists such as Ken Goldberg, Eric Paulos, and Eduardo Kac of how to exploit the internet within a more expansive context and engage a greater number of participants. For me, however, the significance of the internet in telepresent art relates not only to the interface which allows control by a remote agency, but also references the philosophies of Thomas Hobbes in his book Leviathan (1651) on a single, self-organising system and artificial intelligence. The interesting point to note about artworks such as Masaki Fujihata’s Light on the Net and Rafael Lozano-Hemmers Vectorial Elevation, is not just about enabling individuals to control robots in remote places, but more about Hobbes’ therories - taking the result of the individuals actions and considering them as one. If we were to ignore the fact that telerobots are controlled by separate clients sitting at workstations in various locations across the globe, then we could perhaps suggest that such robots are controlled solely by one sovereign intelligence - the internet.
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