| rafael lozano-hemmer |
selected projects and videos note: quicktime 6.0 or later is needed to view the videos |
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| new videos | While we update this page, here are some videos of recent projects:
Pulse Front, Toronto, June 2007. |
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homographies subsculpture 7 o Sydney Biennale 2006, Art Gallery of New South Wales |
HOMOGRAPHIES is an interactive installation featuring 144 robotic fluorescent light fixtures controlled by 7 computerized surveillance systems. As people walk under the piece, the light tubes rotate to create labyrinthine patterns of light that are "paths" or "corridors" between them. In Homographies the "vanishing point" is not architectural, but rather connective, i.e. it is determined by who is there at any given time and varies accordingly. This gives a reconfigurable light-space that is based on flow, on motion, on lines of sight, —an intended contrast to the modernist grid that currently organizes the court. With the assistance of Conroy Badger, Matt Biederman, Sandra Badger, Natalie Bouchard and Will Bauer. |
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entanglement subsculpture 6 o Galerie Guy Bärtschi, Geneva 2005 |
ENTANGLEMENT consists of two identical neon signs each measuring 150 x 35 cm. The signs show the word "Entanglement" a term used in quantum physics to describe the strange property exhibited by two particles that behave as one. The two signs are placed in two separate rooms, even in two different cities. Under each sign there is a normal light switch that turns it on and off. However, the light switches are also linked through two computers connected to the Internet. In this way the neon signs automatically write email to each other so that they are both either ON or OFF and never independent. This means that for example, the neon will turn ON at a strange time, as someone on the other side of the world just switched his or her copy of the entangled pair ON. With the assistance of Conroy Badger, Natalie Bouchard and Matt Biederman. |
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under scan relational architecture 11 o Lincoln: Nov. 25 to Dec. 4, 2005 |
UNDER SCAN is a large-scale public art project commissioned by the East Midlands Development Agency in England. Thousands of "video-portraits" taken in Derby, Leicester, Lincoln, Northampton and Nottingham will be projected onto the ground of the main squares and pedestrian thoroughfares of these cities. At first, the portraits will not be visible because the space will be flooded by white light coming from the world’s most powerful projector. As people walk around the area, their shadow will be cast on the floor, revealing the video-portraits. The short video sequences begin with the subjects in a still position turned away from the camera. As they appear within pedestrians' shadows, their bodies move and their heads turn to look straight at the pedestrian, potentially giving rise to an interesting range of interactions. When a shadow moves away from a portrait, the portrait likewise reacts by losing interest and looking away. With the assistance of a large team of developers, ArtReach production and Stage Right staging. |
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subtitled public o Dataspace Exhibition, Conde Duque Art Center, Madrid 2005 |
SUBTITLED PUBLIC consists of an empty exhibition space where visitors are tracked with a computerized infrared surveillance system. As people enter the installation, texts are projected onto their bodies: these “subtitles” consist of thousands of verbs conjugated in third person and they follow each individual everywhere they go. The only way to get rid of a subtitle is to touch someone else: the words then are exchanged between them. The piece invades the supposed neutrality of the space that museums and galleries set-up for contemplation, underlining the violent and asymmetric character of observation. Subtitled Public also highlights the danger of surveillance systems that typecast and try to detect different ethnic groups or suspicious individuals, as in the latest computer-vision devices that are being deployed in public spaces around the world. Finally, the installation is an ironic commentary on our era of technological personalization, literally branding all spectators and converting them into “thematic individuals”. With the assistance of Conroy Badger, Will Bauer, Ana Parga, Maria Parga, Tara DeSimone and Matthew Marino. Produced by the BBVA-Bancomer Foundation in Mexico City. |
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glories of accounting subsculpture 5 o ARCO Black Box, bitforms, Madrid 2005 |
GLORIES OF ACCOUNTING is an interactive installation with a surveillance system that detects the position of the public in the exhibition room. When someone walks into the room, large hands appear on the screen automatically. The hands rotate along their forearm axis, following the visitor with the open palms always facing him or her. As more people enter the room, more hands appear and each follows a member of the public. Ultimately the piece is a visualization of electronic detection, using a metaphor that signifies both distance (as in a “stop” gesture) and inclusion (as in the expression “show of hands”). With the assistance of Susie Ramsay, Conroy Badger, Tara DeSimone and Steve Gibson. |
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synaptic caguamas subsculpture 4 o OMR, Mexico City 2004. |
SYNAPTIC CAGUAMAS is a large motorized Mexican “cantina” table with 30 “Caguama”-sized beer bottles (1-litre each). The bottles spin on the table with patterns generated by cellular automata algorithms that simulate the neuronal connections in the brain. Every few minutes the bottles are reset and seeded with new initial conditions for the algorithm so that the movement patterns are never repeated. This kinetic sculpture is a primitive and absurd attempt to materialize the mathematics of recollection and thought. With the assistance of Conroy Badger, Will Bauer, Sandra Badger, Karl-Erik Riesach, Peggy Strong, Robyn Badger, Jennifer Laughlin, Denis Sulivan, Olav Kahlbaum and OMR gallery. |
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standards and double standards subsculpture 3 o Art Basel 35, Unlimited, OMR, Basel 2004 |
STANDARDS AND DOUBLE STANDARDS is an interactive installation that consists of fifty fastened belts that are suspended at waist height from stepper motors on the ceiling of the exhibition room. Controlled by a computerized tracking system, the belts rotate automatically to follow the public, turning their buckles slowly to face passers-by. When several people are in the room their presence affects the entire group of belts, creating chaotic patterns of interference. Non-linear behaviours emerge such as turbulence, eddies and relatively quiet regions. One of the aims of this piece is to visualize complex dynamics, turning a condition of pure surveillance into an unpredictable connective system. The piece creates an "absent crowd" using a fetish of paternal authority: the belt. With the assistance of Conroy Badger, Will Bauer, Sandra Badger, Karl-Erik Riesach, Peggy Strong, Robyn Badger, Billy Kwan, Jennifer Laughlin, Denis Sulivan and Olav Kahlbaum. Funded with a Rockefeller Fellowship and a Langlois Grant. |
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sitestepper relational architecture 10 o Museum of Contemporary Art, Los Angeles 2004 go to the online project: |
SITESTEPPER is an Internet program that shows a 3D view of an apparently "neutral" living room. This space can be transformed automatically by scanning a website to extract its images, texts, colours and sounds. The system analyzes the contents of the submitted webpage and uses them to furnish and decorate the room, "branding" the space with a layer of live media. With the assistance of Chong Zhang and Emilio López-Galiacho. This project was commissioned for LA MOCA's digital gallery. |
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frequency and volume relational architecture 9 o Laboratorio Arte Alameda, Mexico 2003 see videos: |
FREQUENCY AND VOLUME consists of between 100 and 800 square metres of projected shadows which allow participants to scan the radio spectrum of the city with their bodies. As a shadow appears it tunes any radio frequency between 150kHz to 1.5GHz based on its position monitored by a video tracking system. The size of the shadow controls the volume gain of the specific audio channel. We can have 16 frequencies tuned simultaneously and the resulting sound environment is a composition controlled by people's movements. This piece investigates the contested radio space in the context of the increased surveillance of the body as an antenna. The system tunes all sorts of signals including air traffic control, short wave radio, cell phones, police, taxi dispatch, pagers and more. With the assistance of Conroy Badger. |
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1000 platitudes
o bitforms, NYC 2003 |
1000 PLATITUDES consists of large photomontages and one video documentary, which is shown on a plasma screen. Words commonly used to describe the generic globalized city are written with a created alphabet; --each letter of the alphabet was projected on a different building using the World's most powerful projector (with 110,000 ANSI lumen intensity and images measuring up to 70x70 m). To realize this work, the projector was placed on a 12-ton truck with a diesel electricity generator. Public housing projects, shopping malls, government buildings, industrial wastelands and corporate headquarters were transformed by fast tactical projections from the mobile platform, under the radar of potential regulators. This project was made during the "Huge and Mobile" (HUMO) Workshop in Linz, Austria, with the support of V2 (Rotterdam) and the Ars Electronica Center (Linz). |
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amodal suspension relational architecture 8 o Yamaguchi Center for Art and Media, Japan 2003 go to the online project: |
AMODAL SUSPENSION is a large-scale interactive installation developed for the opening of the Yamaguchi Center for Arts and Media (YCAM) in Japan. From the 1st to the 24th of November 2003 people could send short text messages to each other using a cell phone or web browser. However, rather than being sent directly, the messages were encoded as unique sequences of flashes with 20 robotically-controlled searchlights, turning the sky around the YCAM Center into a giant communication switchboard. Messages remained bouncing around the sky, until someone would "catch" them with a cell phone or a 3D internet interface. Once caught, a message would be removed from the sky, shown on the internet or cell phone interface and projected on the façade of the museum. With the assistance of a large team, please see the complete credits. |
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two origins relational architecture 7 o Festival Printemps de Septembre |
TWO ORIGINS transforms the emblematic Place du Capitole by projecting the heretic "Book of Two Origins", a 13th century manuscript compiling the core theological beliefs of the dualist Cathars. Once a vibrant community in Toulouse, believers in two universal origins were virtually annihilated by the brutal crusades that gave birth to the Inquisition and France. The texts overlap as they are projected from two separate projectors; only when passers-by block one of the texts with their body is the other text readable within his or her shadow. "Two Origins" attempts to connect disparate planes of experience, inviting people to scan texts that had been folded by history and intolerance. With the assistance of Jennifer Laughlin. |
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body movies relational architecture 6 o V2, Cultural Capital of Europe see videos : |
BODY MOVIES transforms public space with 400 to 1,800 square metres of interactive projections. Thousands of photo portraits taken on the streets of the cities where the project is exhibited are shown using robotically controlled projectors. However, the portraits only appear inside the projected shadows of local passers-by, whose silhouettes measure between 2 to 25 metres high, depending on how far people were from the powerful light sources placed on the floor of the square. A custom-made computer vision tracking system triggers new portraits as old ones are revealed. With the assistance of 6 developers.
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33 questions per minute relational architecture 5 o Havana Biennial 2000 |
33 QUESTIONS PER MINUTE consists of a computer program which uses grammatical rules to combine words from a dictionary and generate 55 billion unique, fortuitous questions. The automated questions are presented at a rate of 33 per minute --the threshold of legibility-- on 21 tiny LCD screens encrusted on the support columns of the exhibition hall or mounted on a wall. The system will take over 3,000 years to ask all possible questions. A keyboard allows participants to log on to the building and add their own questions to the automatic flow. With the assistance of Will Bauer, Conroy Badger, Ana Parga, María Velarde Torres, Luis Jiménez-Carlés, Luis Parga and Gabriela Raventós. English version with the assistance of Rebecca MacSween.
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vectorial elevation relational architecture 4 o Zócalo Square see videos: go to the online project: |
VECTORIAL ELEVATION was an interactive art project originally designed to celebrate the arrival of the year 2000 in Mexico City's Zócalo Square. The website www.alzado.net allowed anyone to design immense light sculptures over the historic centre of the city, using an online 3D interface. The designs were rendered by 18 robotic searchlights placed around the square; these lights could be seen from a 15Km radius. A personalized web page was made for every participant with comments, stats and virtual and real images of their design from three perspectives. In Mexico 800,000 people from 89 countries participated. The project was later shown for the opening of the Basque Museum of Contemporary Art in Vitoria (300,000 participants), at the fête des Lumières in Lyon (600,000 participants), and for the EU expansion celebrations in Dublin (520,000 participants). With the assistance of ten developers.
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re:positioning fear relational architecture 3 o Film+Architektur Biennale go to the online project: |
RE:POSITIONING FEAR was the third relational architecture project. A large scale installation on the Landeszeughaus military arsenal with a “teleabsence” interface of projected shadows of passers-by. Using tracking systems, the shadows were automatically focused and generated sounds. A real-time IRC discussion about the transformation of the concept of "fear" was projected inside the shadows; the chat involved 30 artists and theorists from 17 countries and the proceedings can be seen at the project web site. Collaboration with Will Bauer. With the assistance of Robert Rotman, Conroy Badger, Nell Tenhaaf and 30 symposium participants.
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displaced emperors relational architecture 2 o Ars Electronica Festival |
DISPLACED EMPERORS was the second relational architecture project. This installation used an "architact" interface to transform the Habsburg Castle in Linz, Austria. Wireless 3D sensors calculated where participants pointed to on the facade and a large animated projection of a hand was shown at that location. As people on the street "caressed" the building, they could reveal the interiors, which corresponded to Chapultepec Castle, the Habsburg residence in Mexico City. In addition, for ten schillings, people could press the "Moctezuma button" and trigger a temporary post-colonial override consisting of a huge image of the Aztec head-dress that is kept at the ethnological museum in Vienna. Collaboration with Will Bauer and Susie Ramsay. With the assistance of Daniel Rivera and Patricia Maier.
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the able skin
o Monterrey Museum, |
THE ABLE SKIN is a media structure designed by architect Emilio López-Galiacho to hide any emblematic building that is not allowed to have a natural death, that is kept alive artificially through restoration, citation and simulation. A virtual reality installation allows participants to tour the first Able Skin, which covers Palladio's Villa Rotonda. The participant’s motion controls the point of view in the projected environments on the wall and the floor. Collaboration with Emilio López-Galiacho and Will Bauer.
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the trace, remote insinuated presence
o ARCO 1995 |
THE TRACE is a telepresence installation that invites two participants in remote sites to share the same telematic space. The piece consists of light vectors, sounds and graphics that respond to the movement of the participants. Two interactive stations are needed for the piece; these are interconnected with a normal ISDN digital line so they can be in the same exhibition hall, on either side of a city or in different cities. Collaboration with Will Bauer.
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surface tension
o 2!M, Madrid 1993 |
SURFACE TENSION is an installation with several interactive modules. Originally designed for a technological theatre by TST, the modules consist of animated photos that react to the movements of actors, dancers and the public. Currently the human eye module is shown in a plasma or retro-projection screen with a video-based tracking system that detects the public. Collaboration with Transition State Theory. With the assistance of Bruce Ramsay and Tara DeSimone. |
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