Piano Staircase & The Fun Theory Award

Piano Staircase project was an example for The Fun Theory Award, an initiative of Volkswagen. The award recognizes “thoughts, ideas and inventions that help prove the fun theory. That fun is the easiest way to change people’s behavior for the better.” This particular project was realized in Odenplan, Stockholm with the aim to get “more people to choose the stairs by making it fun to do.” The experiment resulted in 66% more people than normal in choosing the stairs over the escalator. Fun, fun, fun! It also makes an amusing public installation art.

The Fun Theory Award

Piano Stairs from Ibrahim Nergiz on Vimeo.

No Comments / Nov 10.09 / Art / by Jen-Kuang Chang

The Cave of Robot Bats

Memphis Airport Parking Garage | 2009 | Photo by Jen-Kuang Chang

Making field-recording in the underground parking garage of Memphis International Airport was a somewhat conspicuous activity. In addition to numerous cars swinging back and forth like hungry sharks hunting for a spot to park and flocking crowd passing through with “huh?” expression on their faces, I felt emotionally naked as my mind was oddly colonized by acoustic ecologist Gordon Hempton’s remark that “silence is not the absence of something, but the presence of everything.” I stood still like an armless medieval sculpture and pointed my field-recording device upward to capture this alien sonic discovery. The mammoth mechanic device for air circulation, nicknamed the Cave of Robot Bats, unceasingly produced boisterous and piercing sound, while I continued my anomalous meditation on the subject of the essence of silence.

The Cave of Robot Bats | Field-Recorded at Memphis Airport parking garage | 2009 | Jen-Kuang Chang

No Comments / Nov 09.09 / Found Sound / by Jen-Kuang Chang

Sequence

Today is Halloween. The idea of dressing up as myself, no-more-and-no-less, for the annual party of costume fun hovered around my head for the entire duration of Sequence project. “That should scare few kittens and souls,” I muttered, “maybe even myself.” Despite the continuously mindless debate as to the scariness of “me” costume in the hintergrund level, I managed to learn few new things today. The currency unit of Mauritania is Ouguiya. Dayak, the native Malaysian people of Borneo, is known for their long communal houses. And, oh, the top selling single of 1974 is Barbra Streisand’s “The Way We Were.” With my new-found intelligence, I walked out of my apartment, feeling groovy, preparing myself for insightful conversations with at least three well-dressed witches, two Michael Jackson without moonwalk move, one Mozart with Grado SR-60 and thunderous beats, few Jedi Knights, and possibly six and half nameless ghosts with sweet-tooth situation too sugary to handle.

No Comments / Oct 31.09 / Graphics / by Jen-Kuang Chang

Symmetry VII

 

In a day bagged with bad weather, appalling conversations with myself, and a rotten soul, I habitually enslaved myself with a panorama view of peculiarly depressing memories.  Sacrosanct aroma of organic coffee was tainted and sumptuous texture of dark chocolate fouled, making me feel like an archangel of no tomorrow.  In a day like this, it felt like a therapeutic measure to get myself occupied with generative codes and procedures.  A colossus glass of strawberry milkshake should also help.

No Comments / Oct 23.09 / Graphics / by Jen-Kuang Chang

Stream

As usual, I helplessly unfolded into an optimist after few cups of organic coffee and fantasized in sublime ignorance that my out-of-century desktop computer could, beyond any reasonable doubt, successfully render a one-hour long generative audiovisual project in lossless avi format in After Effect CS3. I held my breath. I clicked render. I watched my computer superhero-ing through one hundred hours before sourly giving it up like an adorable crybaby.

The audio track used in Stream was field-recorded during my lovely stay at Millay Colony for the Arts, sharing the intimate space for a month with poet Bruce Snider, painter Kirsten Stolle and Giovanna Cecchetti, and interdisciplinary artist Sujin Lee. The stream was not too far away from a hidden trail behind the main building of the colony. I captured the sound during a gorgeous sunny morning after a oh-way-too-long week of eccentric pouring rain and giant thunders. The nakedly unedited audio track reminds me the raw and uncooked beauty.

Stream | Excerpt | Field-Recorded at Millay Colony for the Arts | 2009 | Jen-Kuang Chang

Millay Colony for the Arts

No Comments / Oct 20.09 / Found Sound, Graphics / by Jen-Kuang Chang