freestanding aluminum and plexiglass sculpture with interactive sound and LED display; 111 X 192 X 50 (deep) cm.
sound by John Kamevaar
1983 - 1995
Us and/or Them, 1983 (videotex database)
Shopping for Value (Systems), 1984 (videotex database)
believable, if not always true, 1987 (videotex installation)
In Vitro (the perfect wound), 1991
horror autotoxicus, 1992 (viewer activated installation)
Oedipal Ounce of Prevention, 1993
The solitary begets herself, keeping all eight cells, 1993
1995 - present
Apparatus for Self-Organization & Orphaned Life-Form, 1995
UCBM (you could be me), 1999 (viewer activated installation)
Swell, 2003 (viewer activated sculpture)
Push/Pull, 2009 (viewer activated sculpture)
TV Breeder, 2011 (v1) by NSF (nous sommes fragiles)
Swell comes into being through viewers' interaction with it. Viewers know from cues of lights and electronic sound whether or not this artificial entity, through a conjunction with their own presence, is "alive." The sound is digitally processed microphone feedback, and is triggered via an ultrasonic sensor when the viewer is about four feet away. It subsequently becomes very loud if one backs off, very quiet if one comes close.
The lights are pure abstraction when the viewer is close, but at a distance of about fifteen feet they come into focus as a moving image of waves breaking.
Swell has an amorphous shape, conveying the idea of an extruded, transparent pod that is materially apt for concepts of self-organization. Its "aliveness" is in the relational space between itself and us.