sketches and models

The three second judgement
We experimented with this thing, walking around all these hundreds of different spaces, of just how long it took us to decide what a space was about and whether we wanted to be in it. At first, we thought, maybe it took about 15 seconds. No, the more we watched our responses, the less time our process of judgement appeared to take. Almost no time at all in fact. Three seconds was generous we decided. Try it yourself. If it takes you any longer than three seconds to arrive at a fairly comprehensive assessment of a space, then we'll be very very surprised. The idea of how long it takes people to form judgements about the spaces they have entered and what you could realistically do to engage someone in that tiny space of time informs much of our work. There's a lot of perceptual psychology we're researching as a result.

Coming in to focus - becoming a role
We saw this simple Kevin Handley piece, beginning with an out of focus head of Fidel Castro. We liked the idea of 'becoming' within this. It was restful, though I didn't want it to resolve to anything, especially not Castro. And it stimulated a thought process around this - when we move into a space, what goes on in us, what do we become and what does the space become to us? How are we interpreted by it and how do we interpret it? These things, these arrivals, are aspects of 'coming into focus'. So I wondered how we could interpret this concept visually (an 'out of focus' image of ourselves, becoming an 'in focus' is one very obvious mirror of what goes on inside us or in the judgments of others). But could we mirror other aspects of this 'becoming' - like, for instance, the way people become a role when they enter the office - when does this role start - when we wake, when we dress, when we walk along the street, when we walk inside the door of the office? The idea of becoming, especially of becoming a role, is an important and rich territory.

Small movements in an unchanging context
There was this image in 'air conditioned' by Su Mei Tse, of a girl playing the cello in front of a blue mountain. It's a satisfying still image, but then this tiny piece of movement occurs within it, generating a sound, which continues beyond the movement. That smallness of change within the picture is really satisfying. Much more like a really lovely painting, but one that is slightly alive. But only alive within its own context - it never changed its context, or moved too much, too fast or attempted to tell a story. It provided enough interest simply to sustain your enjoyment of it. Girl sitting on a stool on a hill, looking at a mountain. Girl plays a few notes to the mountain. Girl stops to listen to the echo. Repeat. We are easily transported to this experience. The simple visual idea of small changes within a small focus of a projected still image is quite powerful.

Movements in time - 'becoming' in context
In a space, instead of presenting an image, why don't we use the time in which people adjust, and allow the image to form at the pace in which the person can adjust to it? If it took 30 seconds for that wonderful Kandinsky picture in the Guggenheim to appear and take form, what would that do to your appreciation of it? Also, this idea that complexity stimulates - what happens when we take a complex form and morph it into something simple? What happens within us if we project at first disorder, yet then create out of it order? One thing becomes another, one person becomes another, depending on the spatial context they inhabit. And on the flow of time in these spaces.

Non-verbal body language
It's what goes on between individuals in a 'meet and greet' space. Even the simple handshake is often not so much a greeting as a form of combative communication - there is a science all about handshakes. As is the audio language of introductions, hellos and goodbyes. There is a lot in the principles of how I react to you and how you then react to me. There's a lot of social norms here, and a lot of anxieties and these points of reaction have a usually temporary influence over the space we're in. What if they weren't temporary, what are the psychic traces of our behaviours? What might they look like? And I am sure the environment can profoundly effect how these social interactions work, or often don't.

Leaving bits of ourselves behind
The idea of leaving - spaces are not just about entering - about projected futures, but about our pasts as well. It always seems as if in leaving a building we leave nothing behind, as if we become invisible ghosts in the history of that space. What if our ghosts could become visible? What if not only the people we met, but the building itself remembers us? In many place the building already does, through surveillance, it's just we're not aware of it, it is hidden and only dimly meaningful to us in a slightly paranoic way. I leave footprints, I leave ideas and thoughtforms, I leave the disturbance of air and light. And sometimes I am changed.

How can this space deal with my efforts and expectations?
What efforts we have to make when we enter a space - we're concerned really with so many things - our role, what's expected of us, how we're going to prepare, what we'll say, how we look, how we'll be received, where we'll sit etc… All of these anxieties can be teased out, reflected upon visually and addressed. What happens to our anxieties when we are met with something really unexpected? Drawing the experience of arriving in a space into the space itself is somehow interesting. What mode of transport did I use, what were my perceptions as I came into this town, this street. How did the outside of the building look to me. How many psychic expectations and judgements have I built up at this point - 2, 3, 100? And what happens to these expectations as I go further into the space - in the lift, up the stairs, along the hallway, in through the doors? How can the space I am in deal with all the baggage of expectation I have now brought with me?

Repetition of small things on a grand scale
Wallpaper. Digital wallpaper. Moving wallpaper. Wallpaper made of light. Computer generated wallpaper that creates interpretations of what is sees from a bank of creative rules. The dice-room at the Venice Biennale, Michal Rovners three walled room of miniature walking men. This repetition of a simple, uncomplicated sound also has these hypnotic qualities. Audio visual wallpaper. Could we be hypnotised by it?

Reflection
The visual feedback loop made possible by cameras hooked to a display. The possibilities of time-delay in this visual feedback loop. How we can use time within the context of people moving through spaces - ie. on a simple level, the notion of 'rehearsal', establishing a time delayed audio/visual feedback. Echo and Narcissus - the idea of the image only repeating back what it sees, but somehow altered, processed to establish a new form of communication or dialogue. The hall of mirrors, distortion - not just of the image but of time. The re-ordering of time in sequential playback. Virtual mirrors masquerading as actual mirrors.

Exploding the moving image canvas
In looking at all this projected imagery, so much of it is still like a 4:3 TV set. There is no need for this. It can be round, or long and thin, or any shape at all. This display space we're developing for Perth Concert Hall, the Threshold Wave, it's about 30:1, or 28,000 pixels wide. Aborigines, when they first saw polaroids of themselves, were unable to recognise the images they saw. We are all like that, conditioned to see things only in certain ways, conditioned by familiarity to accept some illusions of reality and not others. The moving image is about to explode out - away from cinemas, away from gallery installations, away from 4:3 or 16:9. It can be part of an object, shining out from within. To work with an architect who could create these uniquely shaped 'canvas' areas as part of the conceived internal spaces of a building - now that would be interesting.