Wednesday, October 15, 2008

TEXTile

If you're going to be around Philadelphia sooner or later be sure to check out the Fabric Workshop and Museum.
There contemporary artist Jean Shin recycled 22,528 keyboard-keys into a sculpture. Not a conventional one such as Michellangelo's David (who recently became a victim of photoshop by the way) but more like an interactive installation, like Design And The Elastic Mind.

From head to tail the massive keyboard actually reads the correspondence between the artist who came up with the idea and the people who made it. (So letters from keyboard keys become words and words become sentences).

Furthermore the last three lines of keys are connected to a processor and to a screen on the other end of the installation. By typing letters on those last three lines people can create words on the screen (see the second picture).

The idea behind the project is that, though we live in a world where a lot is digital we still use the movement of our hands and fingers to write a message which is perceived by someone else.

-jdh

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