Interactive Portraits

       This time I am blogging about the Interactive Portraits and Body Movies by Rafael Lorenzo-Hemmer on page one hundred of our Digital Art text. I found this very small reading interesting enough to do a bit of research, and what I discovered was equally as interesting in my opinion.


        Explaining the example project in the text, Artist Hemmer robotically controlled these projectors located on the walls of Schouwburgplein Square in Rotterdam to show portraits of people from all around the world. However, and here's the interesting part, the portraits were invisible at first glance due to overly bright lights on the floor shining up toward them. That is, until any person walking nearby would cast their shadow on the wall, at which time these 'invisible portraits' would appear and be made fully visible within that person's shadow. This would then inevitably leave the person standing there in front of their own silhouette but seeing a stranger's face and/or body within it. I found this concept to be extremely cool, as it made me want to interact with it myself.




   
    So, remember when I said that I found some equally as interesting stuff about this guy? Well, it turns out it's not so terribly hard to find other works by Hemmer. Actually, the guy has his own really cool website, which contains all kinds of other projects he has orchestrated. For instance, he's got this other cool 'shadow piece' called Bifurcation. All it is, is a single 'y' shaped branch hanging in front of a large white screen by a thin string. With the help of a light projector, and a small motor that creates some air flow, the makeshift mobile moves slightly back and forth while the small branches' shadow is cast upon the screen. What makes this project so interesting, is the shadow from that little 'y' shaped branch actually looks like the full sized tree that it came from with many branches, not just one. Not only that, but since this piece is mobile, people can interact with it a bit by touching the string and making it move more. What's cool about that is, when it's moved, the tiny branch and it's tree-like shadow remain "oriented in the same way", according to the description on the website. Additionally, this project was inspired by friends of the artist "who insisted that absence and presence are not opposites".




       Aside of shadow based art, Hemmer has created many other unique interactive projects. One other piece that stuck out to me on the website is called Voice Array. This interactive art uses sound and light instead of shadows. According to the description on the site, any participant can speak into an intercom, and his or her voice is automatically translated into flashes of light which then makes a unique blinking pattern that is stored as a loop in the first light of the array. It's a little more complex than the other two involving shadows, but I thought it was cool enough to mention here.




     
       Hemmer actually has created a lot of really cool interactive art projects, and it was because of a very small class reading that I learned that. Truthfully, I don't usually do very well with the reading assignments because I find myself getting bored and sleepy and wishing I could be doing some kind of Photoshop work instead. Anyway, I learned some cool stuff with this one, and I realized that I like interactive art. Here's the website if you want to take a look at the above mentioned or other works from Hemmer. I hope you enjoy it as much as I did. 
http://www.lozano-hemmer.com/projects.php

Signing Off,

Nancy Maher