Observation of Beautiful Things:
Kaleidoscope on display at @artbathnyc
With this, I’m done with the kaleidoscope journey and on to new things.
By default it shows a kaleidoscopic video feed of the outside world, and you can look around on the tripod. Dialling numbers on the rotary phone brings up videos through the kaleidoscope.
In these clips I’ve got FIRE (3473) which is a clip of @thefiremingos doing their thing, and 911 which plays Help! by the Beatles. 411 brought up a sample directory of the ~100 codes available, and 74257655… always my favorite.
Inside it has 22” of front surface mirror in an equilateral triangle, a 6” circular lcd display powered by a raspberry pi mini computer and camera. Rotary dial and hang up switch was wired to the pi, and it was all inside a standard pvc tube. Mirrors were supported by a foam roller with the triangle cut out of it. Decorations and phone/battery holder were 3D printed at the new @brooklyn_spark makerspace.
Set up a home message system for people to leave messages on my wall. A “cat printer” leaves receipts of all the messages in case I miss one.
Components: Website built with Astro.js, Vestaboard, Catprinter, all connected with custom HomeAssistant addons
More backlog, wanted a dining room table for my house and decided to try my hand at a slab table.
Immediately screwed up as it deformed in my non-flat transport option, but managed to get it “flat” again. It took a laser level and many hours on planers/sanders, but happy with how it came out!
Red oak slab, EcoPoxy resin, and Rubio Monocoat. Cast iron legs (purchased on Etsy) and a brass bar.
Reaching into some previous work, this was Fragments Together at Burning Man last year.
Burning Man is one of the most wasteful events out there. While we couldn’t live without producing waste, the idea of creating unnecessary waste makes me deeply uncomfortable.
This was an internationally broken ceramic planter pot, strung up around a tube of programmable LEDs that cast beautiful fragments on the floor.
If asked what we can make that’s worth the waste… my answer is art. To create this I had to fire functionally useless ceramic pieces, and produce other waste along the way. It was worth it.
Programmable LEDs on a wooden dowel, with ceramic pieces hanging on thin black wire. My ‘chase’ program moves two light sources around the tube.
( Photo quality is unfortunately low. I was planning to get some better footage, and then it rained… )
Kaleidoscope at Burning Man.
It was a learning experience trying to build something to last the week out there— but it made it! Barely. (See the last photo for what it looked like when I picked it up on the last morning.)
Inside it had an 8ft long equilateral 9” triangle of mirrors. At the end was an iPad screen covering the triangle. On the viewing end was a rotary dial that acted as a Bluetooth keyboard for the iPad, and speaker, and some acrylic to try seal the tube from dust.
By default the iPad showed a live video of what its camera was capturing, but if you dialled a number on the rotary phone a custom app would select and play one of many videos I had preloaded on it.
Outside design and stand still by @mattbkphilly and @cloudy_aahhh . @warrenbnyc helped reinforce the stand, without which I doubt it would’ve made it 🙏.
Created a couple smaller bonus kaleidoscopes which worked when you placed your phone in a slot in the front. Included a sample of that as well, might make more of them!
#kaleidoscope #videoart #mirrorart
Made an 8ft kaleidoscope for @callingallmagicalpeople , and busy making some improvements on it (way less fragile!) before taking it to Burning Man
8ft of mirrors in a triangle, narrowing to an iPad at the app. Custom app that either previews the live camera feed, or plays a video. You can use the rotary phone next to the kaleidoscope to pick videos and hear the audio.
Decorations/stand by @mattbkphilly and @cloudy_aahhh
