Professional skills&future career path:
The summer show ,which will be held by the Hannah Peschar Sculpture Garden, gives me a good opportunity to practice my new project in a public space. The core concept of the show takes the main elements from th WWF’s ‘Just Imagine' Creative Call Out as inspiration, which are as follows:
We want you to reimagine a future where we celebrate and protect nature.
What would our rebuilt future look like if we put nature at the heart of our decisions?
We want to see artistic exploration of how we can best live in harmony with our planet.
My installation "Breath" is honored to be included in the summer show.
“Breath” is an artistic sculpture able to test the carbon dioxide concentration around the plant. It can convert the concentration values into colors of lights.
As we know, Plants mitigate global warming through photosynthesis—by absorbing carbon dioxide and releasing oxygen, plants help the earth breath. The ability to soak up carbon dioxide and fix it in plants or soil, thereby reducing its concentration in the atmosphere is called Carbon Sink. However, as the global temperature keeps rising, this kind of valuable ability of plants has been increasingly undermined.
It’s sad that plants have no chance to make their voices heard, so they can only stand quietly and protect the earth. Having taken it for granted for a long time, human beings ignore and consume such green protection. • If neither the earth nor plants breathe, will human beings have any chance to breathe in fresh air?
Undoubtedly, this is the last thing we would like to face. Hence, I design the work called “Breath”. I strongly hope plants can express themselves through my work.
To be honest, there were a lot of challenges to take up during the whole process. First of all, both works are inter-disciplinary installations. Breath involves programming, rather complicated electronic system and multiple material processing (such as 3D printing, metal processing, and core control processing). In addition, as it is displayed outdoors, I need to anticipate potential problems and take into account every detail: waterproof, resistance to high temperature during summer, power supply, coral control system, and countless tests.
I really love the video which Rob show us how the sensor of “Breath” detects concentration of CO2 and convert its values into colors of lights. The higher the value is, the darker the red light becomes, for the purpose of warning the visitors. If the value is low, the light will turn to green. Super Rob~
SLG is a famous gallery with a long history in London. Before submitting the exhibition proposal, I visited the gallery by myself, noticing the high ceiling and wonderful skylight in the major area of gallery, from which light can easily and fully penetrate the materials with different transparency. By reflecting and overlapping, this installation can provide a natural, harmonious and layered visual experience. The wooden floor with a sense of age also accords with the theme of work. However, it poses some challenges as well, which propels me to refine the details of my work.
First, to display a large installation in this tall exhibition hall, it is necessary to consider how to move the work from the studio, as well as the size of aisles and elevators. Second, the work should be installed on-site quickly, especially with its large drawing and hanging parts. The biggest problem is to control the speed and direction of water flow, so that it will not splash onto the wooden floor.
In this case,all pipes can be spliced and are firmly fixed with screws to ensure stability.
All hanging parts are equipped with hooks to avoid sticking or tying on site.
By embedding a transmission to control the current of motor, I succeed in controlling the flow of water pump.
Recently I am busy with a research project named Spirit Garden. Related with brain science and AI, it will become the third work of my Garden series.
As shown in the image, the visitor passes through curtains before entering the center area. This process intends to lead the visitor to trickle into the temple of mind. When he interacts with the “flower”, the AI system will perceive his emotion by analyzing his brain wave in real time, allowing the flower to talk with the visitor through audio system. During the interaction, the flower shape changes along with the emotion fluctuation to lighten the visitor’s mood.
NEXT
