wind and degradation

December, 2010

We largely control that which touches us, and that which we touch. In fact, when we experience unwanted touch, we feel violated and even degraded. Yet the wind touches us daily without invitation or permission; sometimes we feel annoyed, surprised, happy, alive, etc., but we rarely feel as violated as we would with an unwanted touch. Why is this? What would happen if we saw the wind as violation and degradation?

Since the feeling of degradation generally comes from a human-based interaction, I decided to create the wind by having the user blow into a pinwheel. I captured the speed of the pinwheel (essentially the speed of the wind, and of the user’s breath) and used it to degrade video footage projected onto a screen in real time. This exploration would allow the user to view wind in a different way, and see it from the emotional side of things instead of the scientific. Ideally, they would see the wind as a violation of touch.

Created with Arduino and Max/MSP.