The City Reverie of Mini Dot

Artwork by Blue Phoenix New Media Arts Work Description This is a permanent public art installation in Taipei, Taiwan. It’s an interactive artwork built upon the wall of Taipei Cultural Center, a place hosting many performances from dance, music to other related fields. It’s the first step of a large project by Taipei City Government that plan to decorate different walls of public architectures in the city. Inspired by the images of the little person representing “walk” and “stop” sign of traffic light, the artists of Blue Phoenix New Media Arts chose the subject that uses the same material（LED panels） and the same resolution（16*16 pixels）of traffic light as a method of artistic expression. The artwork consists of three parts, the walk-by area, the traffic light main stage area, and the Window of the City.  the walk-by area Near the base of the wall, there is a row of LED panels （8 of them in total）, and each of the panel consists of a specific theme. As the passengers walk by the sidewalk of the building, the sensors embedded in the wall would be triggered and then causing the themes to change their contents. Take the TV theme for example, when people walk by it, the TV set would turn into a TV-aquarium or a TV with a smiling face. Sometimes, even a ghost would climb out from inside the television.  the traffic light and the main stage area This area consists of two part, the first part is a made-up traffic light that sits on the sidewalk of the opposite side of the road from the building; the second part is the main stage area which consists of 4 rows of LED panels aligned with the outline of the wall. There are also many themes for this part of the artwork. If nobody touches the button of the traffic light, the person inside it, “the Mini Dot”, would fall asleep, and the themes on the main stage area would play its “normal status” animation. However, when someone touches the button, it would wake up the “Mini Dot”, and trigger the “special status” animation. Take the “Dancers” theme for example, before the button of the traffic light is pressed, there are only several people doing some stretching and warming-up exercises; once the button is pressed, more people would run into the stage, stand in lines, and perform different styles of street dancing.  the Window of the City There is a virtual window placed near the top of the wall, titled “Window of the City”. During the daytime, it works like a mirror that reflect the different weathers of the city. When the sky is getting dark, it turns into the windows that play silhouette animations of different stories. It was deliberately made so that the viewers would feel like they are seeing through a window of normal citizen’s life. It’s the window that reveals the rhythms of the city. Through happiness or sadness, laughter and tears, it shares the emotions inside the city. Concept Waiting at an intersection is like an interlude in our sojourn through the city’s spaces, in which we stop, observe, unconsciously muse, and daydream. This artwork treats one of the visual experiences in Taipei residents’ lives – the little green man walking inside the pedestrian traffic light –through humorous, creative, simple animations and easy interactions (triggered through an interactive make-believe traffic light placed across the street and ultrared sensors installed along the foot of the wall), transforms the wall of a quiet building into an intriguing and imaginative “city stage.” During the day, the simulated square window on this wall reflects the urban sky. At night, it is like a window into the heart of the city, revealing night scenes in imagined households.

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Google Video | March 1, 2007

Tags:. .viewers. .urban. .upon. .panels. .opposite