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ClickScape 98
Views of Linz. Clickable Public Space
' STWST
STWST
http://www.servus.at/clickscape98SYNOPSIS An interweaving of physically real and virtual spaces, and their inhabitants. A large-scale communications sculpture is created by the instrumentalization of public space, realized by means of the link-up of that space to the international data networks.COMPONENTS Public real space, Public network space, Art under construction, Graphics – Text – Sound
Art under construction in the times of the Communication Society (with its digital and electronic net-world). One space expands into the other. The tiny surface of the computer screen as input interface expands into the three-dimensional space of the city. In our case, a space that has left a highly distinctive mark on the cityscape of Linz, a space that has already become an established large-scale stage. The Danube District surrounding the Nibelungen Bridge, bounded on the south by the building facades of financial firms and insurance companies, an outgrowth of the old urban development plan. Across from them, the rescued building stock of Old Urfahr East, dedi-cated to culture thanks to the recently-revised development plan. Connected by the Nibelungen Bridge. To experience this work-in-progress, visitors have two modes of access available: the traditional one – by actually spending time in this physical space, whether as an everyday passer-by or as an invited guest – and the international one, independent of one’s physical location, via Internet. Meeting place: Linz. Guests from the Internet have the opportunity to intervene in real physical space and thus to communicate with those persons present. Components of our interactive communications sculpture are graphics, sound and text.
Graphics – EA-Generali Building
Sound – Nibelungen Bridge
Text – Wild ivy – Electronic running text display on the Stadtwerkstatt BuildingTHE INSTRUMENTARIUM The installation is operated through the Internet. A conventional web browser serves as the input instrument.
GRAPHICS
EA-Generali Building – Pixel graphics
The EA-Generali Building as an interactive light sculpture that can be controlled via Internet.
By clicking on the live image of the building that is fed into the Internet, the light in whichever window has been activated on the real building is either switched on or off.
This brings about the possibility of designing the building’s facade similarly to a pixel graphic. Individual letters can be drawn on the front of the building, patterns or ornaments can be created. Animation sequences are also possible. This can become a form of play: a number of people can participate simultaneously in the creation of the graphic composition.
SOUND
Nibelungen Bridge – A sound runs over the bridge
Loudspeakers installed on the lampposts along the bridge’s pedestrian walkway offer WorldWideWebbers the opportunity to send passers-by acoustic messages and to observe their reactions via webcam.
There is a sequencer available on the web page by means of which a net user can combine the tones available there into a composition for the bridge, which the user can also hear during a virtual stroll across the bridge before sending the finished work to the bridge for playback.
Net visitors accompany the pedestrians tonally across the bridge.
TEXT
Stadtwerkstatt Building – WILD IVY
Wild ivy – electronic running text that proliferates on the facade of the Stadtwerkstatt Building.
An additional video camera is focused on the Stadtwerkstatt Building, and thus at the running text display mounted on its facade, as well as the people who gather on the square in front of it. The WorldWideWebber can enter a text into his browser which then becomes visible – for the Internet user, via video image; for the individuals present on-site, on the building itself. The invisible human from cyberspace gets to have his say right on the cityscape of Linz.
The fundamental intention of the project – which can also be viewed by means of the webcam – is that the graphics, sound and texts that have been input via Internet ought not to just fizzle out somewhere in cyberspace, but rather crystallize as interventions in physical-real space.THE EXPLOSION OF THE MONITOR IN
A flat, 14 x 17 inch (in the case of most home users) surface, consisting of up to 1600 x 1200 points of light which can display all colors.
Two loudspeakers, usually of inferior quality.
A mouse.
A keyboard.
OUT
A building, 12 stories high, 9 windows wide
A bridge, 300 meters long
A running text display: 41 x 8 bulbs – 6.5 meters long
Through the interweaving of the network space with the real space, the user’s physical intervention capacity undergoes expansion of its physical size/perceptibility. Since this expansion takes place almost instantaneously, we can characterize it as an explosion.
The intervention of the Internet user does not occur – as is the case with practically every action in the net – for the purpose of inputting something into it and thus manifesting something in virtual space.
The intervention brings about massive changes in physical space which can be experienced by viewers/listeners in Linz who are restricted only by the limitations of their own sense organs.
The actors sitting in front of their computer screens are perhaps not even aware of the power that is made available to them by this instrumentarium, since they, in turn, also experience the consequences of their massive interventions only by means of computer devices through which their perceptive faculties are massively restricted.
They see a 12-story building as a tiny, 10 x 10 centimeter graphic, a 300-meter-long bridge fitted with 16 pressure-chamber loudspeakers, and a 6.5-meter-long electronic running text display reduced to 20 centimeters.
Projekt-Team:
Konzept: Thomas Lehner, Markus Seidl, Georg Ritter
Projektleitung: Bert Estl
Realisierung EA Generali Gebäude: Thomas Lehner, Firma Immeg
Wilder Efeu: Franz Xaver, Chris J. Mutter
Webcams/Videotechnik: Thomas Lehner, Chris J. Mutter
Software/Steuerung: H.P. Arremann, Gerald Schranz, Wolfgang Karrer, Markus Seidl
Ton/Musik: Klaus Schmid, Marc Vojka, Klaus Hollinetz, Markus Seidl
Bauleitung: Alfred Wögerbauer
Graphik/Webdesign: Dini Hross, sooshee, Herbert Schager
Server/Leitungen: Chris J. Mutter, Fritz Kron
Finanzen: Judith Vorbach
PR, Redaktion und Dokumentation: Gabriele Kepplinger
Foto: Norbert Artner
Clickable Public Space ist eine Auftragsarbeit des Europäischen Kulturmonat Linz September 1998.
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