LONDONFIELDWORKS
The telematic artwork, Syzygy (1999), was made by a collective of artists including Bruce Gilchrist and Jo Joelson, composer Kaffe Matthews, programmer Jonny Bradley, and writers Steve Beard, Tony White, Jeni Walwin and Mark Wadell. They collaborated with Nic Boothby, Jeremy Boyce and James Robertshaw of the former world champion stunt kite-team AirKraft, electronic engineers from Imperial College, London and material-scientists from the Cranfield Research Institute. At the core of Syzygy was a model of human-environment interaction, demonstrating how art, material science and communications technology can interrelate and develop through poetic application. Syzygy sought to make metaphorical linkages between mind and weather processes, and was initially interested in the emergent features shared by both. For one week in July 1999, the Syzygy project transmitted live brain and weather data from Sanda island, off the West coast of Scotland, to the ICA gallery in London where it animated a sculptural assemblage of smart materials. In an open brief, the writers and composer were invited to respond in some way to the twice daily kite flying experiment.
For the duration of the piece, evolving text and sound files were uploaded daily onto the project website.The final outputs by Steve Beard,
Tony White, Jeni Walwin and Mark Wadell are available in the Black Dog publication, London Fieldworks Syzygy/Polaria.
"....Steve Beard used a list of British islands to create a computerised method of sampling The Tempest. He dubbed his invention the Sanda Island Spirit Generator. The poetry of Shakespeare's lunatic play set on a transformative place that is right on the edge, survived this fragmentation remarkably well - appearing like globs of a torn script slapped in our faces by the wind." 1 Listen>
The core project system was employed in August 1999, to transmit live data from the Megadog Festival in Cornwall during a total solar eclipse to the @Bristol gallery, Bristol.
Syzygy was supported by Arts Council England, The Calouste Gulbenkian Foundation and the
Millenium Commission (The Royal Society and The British Association For The Advancement of
Science).
1. Extract from Tuning In, London Fieldworks Syzygy/Polaria by Tracey Warr, .