Event
Geelong Design Week. Exhibition (2021 : Geelong, Victoria)Publisher
Geelong Design WeekLocation
Tract Consultants - Geringhap StPlace of publication
Geelong, Vic.Start date
2021-03-18End date
2021-03-28Language
engResearch statement
Data (Dada) Lotto was a public artwork located on Geringhap St in Geelong for a curated project, A Journey of Extraordinary Encounters, part of Geelong Design Week. The kinetic work linked three sites around Geelong, collecting, re-presenting and abstracting elemental data contrasting and referencing two disparate things: the early Dada work of Marcel Duchamp, and the effects of climate change. Duchamp's abstract and improbable assemblages (machines) emerged as if from another world, and in central Geelong we built his work, Glider Containing Water Mill in Neighbouring Metals. We put it into action as a key cog in our assemblage that measures the temperature differential between Geelong's city centre and the Botanical Gardens. Temperature sensors at both sites fed information back to the machine at Tract and re-presented the data as the kinetic propulsion and build-up of hundreds of ping pong balls - 'Data (Dada) Lotto'. The greater the differential, the faster the machine operated. The third site - between Eastern Beach and the Botanical Gardens - is integrated into the work: a film of local grasses (poa labillardieri and themeda triandra) and trees (eucalyptus leucoxylon bellarenensis) in danger of being overrun by rampant development. Our climate problems are very real, and manifest in measurable data and often, imperceptible, but devastating ways. This work gave an absurdist and abstracted view of climate data in real-time and in four dimensions.
In the fernery at Geelong's Botanic Gardens and on the Balcony at Plaform Arts Space two temperature sensors inside Stevenson Screens (abstract objects that ensure ambient temperature is measured without direct sunlight) collected and compared data at both sites. The data and its physical manifestation in the speed of the machine proved that the heat island effect of the city was profound. The work continues Bishop & Reis' investigation of new and old technologies, physical computing and elemental data.Publication classification
JO1 Original Creative Works – Visual Art WorkScale
NTRO MinorExtent
1 x MP4 File
5 Colour PhotographsEditor/Contributor(s)
Mary-Jane Walker
