Echoes is a public interactive art installation project that uses projections of blooming flowers to activate a garden during the winter
Site:
Max Family Gardens
Dumbo, Brooklyn
This is the site. What was once an old abandoned tobacco factory has been turned into a public garden. As you can see, the outer wall is accented with all of the original window arches, giving this park a very architecturally distinctive look.
The density of foliage planted also gives this space a look that seems to be brimming with bountiful life and energy…
This garden is also such a resource for the community…
Using the spaces history of abandon then re-invigoration with life, we replicate this experience for the viewer. Thereby keeping this space bountiful year-round.
However during the winter, it is less than inviting.
So this is what we decided it needed
With the animation starting as just a black silhouette of a bud, upon getting closer, the flower begins to bloom and turn its color.
This would also be projected from a projector mounted on top of the outer wall
Process
This project started with an initial visit by my team (Brydon Yao and Vani Gandhi) and I to the space. We arrived and were very much impressed by the space and the substantial nature of the walls and archways. We looked around taking lots of pictures and ended up exploring the area a little. This space had not really sunk in yet but we know there was something special about it.
We would then do research and return with a renewed focus and idea to connect with physical artifacts. This is when you see the space for the first time and it surprised us. We went in the morning and with the sun shining, it left the shadows of the arches on the ground, creating a grid.
This immediately had us thinking about form, something to anchor our ideas into the physical realm with.
Once we had our first physical emobodiment of our idea with inherent ties to the space, we then needed content. So we turned to the idea of plants being our definition of redemption of a space. That what used to fill the walls had purpose rooted in capitalism and what now fills them has the purpose to exist and grow. Making this our connection to movement through growth being synonymical, we decided we wanted to do something with the shape of the windows, in the form of an animation of a plant. We then wanted it to be interactive so we decided that the flowers would need to be triggered by movement. This works perfectly because it gives the viewer power when viewing them, making it more fun for them.
This progressed naturally into projecting as the sun had that morning, using wall mounted projectors, onto the interior walls as the activation of the space.
The final thought was that we need to draw people into the space due to the light blocking nature of the walls. So we decided that we wanted to replicate the morning windows at night, as our continuation of the spaces purpose.
Projections of archways on pier side of building, drawing attention to the space, utilizing projectors mounted in archways.
Drawing the visitors into a space that is activated because of there presence is a powerfull experience for the visitor, but also for those sharing the wonder of something unexpected.
Extra Process Photos
