HONORARY MENTION
RE:Positioning Fear
Will Bauer, Rafael Lozano-Hemmer
During the third international Film + Arc Biennale in Graz, Austria, a Relational Architecture piece transformed the courtyard facade of one of Europe's largest military arsenals, the 350 year old Landeszeughaus. Repositioning Fear used a web site, webcam, 30 trackers, and customized projection technology to connect a very specific instance of Austrian history and architecture with remote and local participants.
The piece was loosely based on the Cathedral's fresco The Scourges of Cod, which depicts the three Medieval fears of the people of Graz:the locust plague (which destroyed the fields in 1477), the Black Death (an epidemic that fortunately never had a devastating outbreak in Graz), and the fall of the city to Turkish invaders (which never happened). The fresco, which shows the oldest view of the city, has been ruined by inclement weather and incompetent restoration attempts, but is survived by a reproduction which can be seen at the Landeszeughaus. Using the fresco as a departure point, RE:Positioning Fear related several historical transformations and displacements of Fear, particularly as parts of the world enter a postindustrial, post-humanist era.
|