Performing Objects: Technology without Purpose

Leonardo

Performing Objects: Technology without PurposeAuthor(s): Timothy RichardsSource: Leonardo, Vol. 17, No. 4 (1984), pp. 237-240Published by: The MIT PressStable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/1575098 .

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Performing Objects: Technology Without Purpose

Timothy Richards

Abstract-The author describes the use of contemporary technology in his sculptures and performances, discussing some of the problems involved. The construction and performance of the piece Entertainment Machinery is described and the artist's motivating philosophy discussed. A project using a computer- generated laser light display is also described.

Fig. 1. Entertainment Machinery, a performing installation built and shown in a 18 x 15 ft room, 1983. The central device is a lawn mower adapted to open and close Venetian blind movie screens. The piece also produced metal sparks, electric arcs, heat and screams in synchronization with the gyrating machinery.

I. INTRODUCTION

My sculptures are energetic electrical and mechanical assemblies which operate with dramatic effects. Each element in my installations is mechanically operational, and each work makes use of physical principles such as Newtonian mechanics and Ohm's Law. The laws of physical science provide the mathematical foundation of my work, comparable to the use of the Golden Section in classical Greek art. My motivation is to apply

Timothy Richards is an artist and teacher. Depart- ment of Art, Northern Illinois University, DeKalb, Illinois 60115, U.S.A. (Received 23 January 1984)

theoretical calculations successfully to create a working installation, and to foster in this way a direct aesthetic enjoyment of technological materials.

II. ENTER TAINMENT MA CHINER Y

My most recent work, Entertainment Machinery (Fig. 1) was the culmination of two months of constructing, adapting and engineering inside an 18 x 15 ft room which had three windows covered by Venetian blinds (Fig. 2). The piece was presented as a performance repeated every hour for 12 hours or until ir- reparable destruction occurred. Between

shows I had 45 minutes to complete any emergency repairs.

The installation was powered by a small gas engine from a discarded lawn mower and attached to the ceiling of the room. I decided to use the engine to open and close the Venetian blinds auto- matically and with great force and thus control rhythmically the amount of daylight in the room. For this purpose I needed a slow, high torque drive turning at about 20 revolutions per minute (rpm). (For comparison, lawn mower engines normally run at 3600 rpm.) I achieved the correct type of drive after two weeks of welding bearings, shafts and pulleys into

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LEONARDO, Vol. 17, No. 4, pp. 237-240, 1984 237



Fig. 2. Diagrams of Entertainment Machinery. The plan and elevation diagrams show the arrangement of the principal devices used. A single 6000-watt electrical unit is formed by the transformer, vacuum cleaner and heaters.

place. I later arranged other shafts to turn at rates from 50 to 500 rpm, making the entire construction vibrate and swing around as it operated the blinds. I

suspended the engine on springs attached to steel cables anchored to the walls. This method of suspension functioned initially but on one occasion a cable snapped and the structure crashed to the floor while I was documenting the finished piece.

I attached a heavy-duty metal grinding wheel onto the original crankshaft of the lawn mower in place of the grass cutting blades. I then attached a piece of steel to the grinder by a spring, to produce a

spray of metal sparks when the engine

was turned on. A plexiglass shield

protected the spectators from flying metal fragments. I used an old air conditioner and sheet metal tubing to extract the exhaust fumes from the room.

The Venetian blinds both controlled the daylight entering the room and acted as screens onto which I projected two films. The closed blinds provided con- tinuous white surfaces bearing the film

images. When the blinds were opened, it was possible to see outside the windows through the film images, which were broken into strips. I enjoyed the resulting dichotomy between real and illusionary images. One of the films showed volcanic

eruptions, which complemented the showers of metal sparks from the grinder. The other film was of a fight between two people. The spectators saw these films in successive transient clips of about 1 /2 seconds duration.

For additional audio-visual effects I

engineered a long extension arm powered by the engine to strike a steel bell and installed an industrial transformer that generated a high voltage arc which also struck the bell. The transformer was wired in series with electric heaters and a vacuum cleaner, which limited the current drain to 30 amps and produced a deafening screech and glowing heat. This,

Richards, Performing Objects 238



combined with the sound of the grinding metal, the gas engine and bell, made for a loud performance.

The performance was determined more by the equipment available to me than by any preconceived ideas about the work. It was an adaptation to environmental factors and an exploration of mechanisms. Some parts, like the sounds from the vacuum cleaner, were intentionally dis- cordant and fragmentary. Some were unplanned-a heater caught fire during the sixth performance and the whole machine fell from the ceiling at one point. Eventually the construction collapsed, leaving only broken and rusting remains.

Audience reactions varied with each performance according to such factors as unexpected mechanical failure, the number of people present and my own mood. The performance was confronta- tional and intimate; I did not use a stage, but rather indicated by floor markings the safe positions for spectators. Feelings of claustrophobia and drama intensified when the room became crowded. Interest heightened especially when the installation malfunctioned and spectators began to doubt my degree of control. The noise and the danger were important aspects of

the performance that I used to produce an immediate, non-intellectual apprehension of the technology in the installation. I intended the performance to be enjoyable and exciting, rather than to raise any specific intellectual questions.

Many of the ideas for this piece came not just from futurism but also from sixties artists, particularly Jean Tinguely and Allan Kaprow [1]. The automated installations of Tinguely achieve a combination of creativity, black humor and destructiveness. His more ominous, gloomy and expressionistic sculptures of a more permanent nature interest me less; I borrowed from the fun, childish and frivolous in his art. Allan Kaprow is

recognized as the founder of the 'assemblages' and 'happenings' [2] of the sixties and early seventies. A general informality with classifications, even those that separate art from day-to-day living, permeates his work.

My materials and methods owe much to these two artists, but I do not share their reaction to modernism and abstraction. Some metaphorical com- ment or involvement with the human condition is inherent in their art, as it is even today in most contemporary

sculpture using mechanical or industrial materials. I avoid overt expressionism because I sense stagnation in such a limited outlook.

The Entertainment Machinery piece put industrial technologies in the context of art, exposing them as closed systems with no intended larger purpose. The installation was an aimless abstraction of

partially related technologies, illuminated by moments of transient beauty.

III. LASER GRAPHICS PROJECT

As my mechanized art uses so many electrical devices, the possibility of electronic control always presented itself to me. It has been difficult, though, to integrate the moderately costly and 'clean' technology of microcomputers with my 'dirty' machines.

My first project to incorporate computers was a system for generating laser-

projected graphics. I used a micro-

computer with two channels of digital-to- analog conversion and 64 kilobytes of memory. Tiny mirrors mounted on

galvanometers (called scanners) deflected a laser beam in the horizontal and vertical axes. The two analog signals from the

Fig. 3. Softvolt, a light display formed by a combination of plastic neon, computer-generated laser projections and a fluorescent tube spinning in a high- voltage, high-density electric field, 12 ft x 12 ft, 1983




computer controlled the amplitudes of horizontal and vertical deflection. Generally, the laser beam moved around faster than the eye could track, creating linear images or words. The information for the images was stored as coordinate points in the computer's memory, making it possible to compose short sequences of animation. To avoid the formality of cinema I used two inflatable structures as laser screens. In other experiments I created unusual effects by combining laser animations with time-

lapse film images. The major disadvantage of the system

was its slowness. The electromechanical scanners could not respond to frequencies above 1 kHz, and so could display only simple, linear, vector graphics. The advantages were the brilliance and clarity of the projections, which were limited in size and intensity only by the power and quality of the laser. With bigger lasers the same equipment could project onto gigantic surfaces like clouds or sky- scrapers. Laser graffiti, murals or advertisements might be formed on the windowless walls of large buildings. Full color video images created by laser light have already been produced by at least one company [3].

In Softvolt, the most recent piece in which I incorporated the laser system, a screen was partially framed by an electrical construction. Beneath the screen a large Tesla Coil-type power supply illuminated 20 ft of coiled plastic tube. The tubing was evacuated by a vacuum pump and terminated inside two glass jars. A spinning blue fluorescent bulb was centered in the laser light display and completed the high-voltage

circuit. The red curvilinear lines of the animated laser display echoed the shapes formed by the coils of glowing plastic tube (see Fig. 3 and color plate No. 2). The flexible plastic required the constant

application of a vacuum pump to maintain low pressure. Perfectly sealing the plastic tube seemed impossible; however, the tube was easily illuminated

using radio frequency high voltage. The whole sculpture was activated by a single foot-switch which the public was invited to depress. The computer would begin generating a program of laser graphics and the pump would evacuate the air from the tubes and jars, causing them to

glow under the high voltage. Each display period lasted about 3 minutes.

The complete automation of all electrical elements in Softvolt facilitated its installation in a formal gallery situation as an art exhibition. The

advantages of an exhibit are that many more people can see an exhibit than can view a performance and that the

spectators may repeat the experience as often as they wish. The disadvantage of such an installation is the loss of

spontaneous artistic participation and flexibility. If something breaks down, the artist cannot incorporate the breakdown into the piece; instead, the construction just doesn't function. For these reasons neither installations in galleries nor theatrical performances entirely satisfy me as methods of art presentation.

The loss of flexibility in the automated pieces may also reflect the economic aspect of the technologies they use. The laser system costs thousands of dollars; my gas engine and high voltage con- structions a few hundred. The sculptures

in which I incorporate computers, lasers and projectors are more tightly controlled and less adaptable than the loose assemblages like Entertainment Machinery, perhaps because it is harder to misuse an expensive technology. We do not wire

personal computers for ringing door bells, nor do we normally use laser tubes as everyday light sources. Expensive, highly specialized machines seem to force us to use them for their intended purposes.

REFERENCES

1. K. G. Pontus Hulton, Jean Tinguely: Meta (Boston: New York Graphic Society, 1975); J. Burnham, Beyond Modern Sculpture (New York: Braziller, 1968); 'Oppenheim-Is Denis a Menace?', Art News (December 1982); L. C. Marcheschi, 'Objects for Producing Visual Phenomena with High Voltage Electricity', Leonardo 5, 141 (1972).

2. A. Kaprow, Assemblage, Environments and Happenings (New York: Abrams, 1968); A. Hansen, A Primer ofHappenings and Time-Space Art (New York: Ultramarine Pub. Co., 1965).

3. P. Hobon, 'Laser Gun T.V.', Omni Magazine (May 1983) p. 36.

GLOSSARY

A galvanometer is an instrument for indicating electrical current by means of mechanical deflection caused by electromagnetic forces. Vector graphics computer displays are linear graphics displays in which only the endpoints of lines are given as coordinates, unlike Raster graphics which scan the whole display and break it up into a grid of discrete units. A Tesla Coil is an air core transformer used with a spark gap and capacitor to produce high voltage at high frequency.




No. 1. Top left. Joshy Stieber. Die Blindengruppe (A Group of Blind People), acrylic on canvas, 160 x 100 cm, 1983.

No. 2. Top right. Timothy Richards. Detail of Softvolt , plastic neon fluorescent tubes and computer-generated projections, 12 x 12 ft, 1983.

No. 3. Bottom left. Tony Robbin. Lobofour, acrylic on canvas with welded steel rods, 8 ft x 12 ft x 18 inches, 1982.

No. 4. Bottom right. Dustin Shuler. (a) A 1964 356 C Porsche. (b) 356 Porsche Pelt, 12 x 15 ft, 1983.















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