” Smoking Lamp ” ( HeHe , 2005 )
Interview / Article byJonah Brucker - Cohen
In the diverse correction of design for public and individual outer space , artists are incessantly creating newfangled ways of envisioning our relationship to the aim we interact with day by day . explore this connection is Helen Evans and Heiko Hansen ( collectively known as “ HeHe ” ) whose oeuvre provides glimpse of the technological system hem in us by pee them more apparent and tactile . From their “ Smoking Lamp ” which outfits a lamp with pollution sensors that effectuate its color when someone is smoke nearby , to create a cover with a matrix of LED twinkle that react to visitors breath in “ Twilight ” , HeHe ’s architectural transformations are compelling reminders how urban space can be image and act upon . Gizmodo speak with HeHe during their creative person abidance atEyebeamin NYC to discuss their projection and the importance of critical invention in mundane sprightliness .
Images and Interview after the jump .
name : Helen Evans and Heiko Hansen ( known collectively as HeHe )
Age(s ): 35 , 37
pedagogy : Mechanical Engineering , Theatre Design , Industrial Design , Computer Related Design , Royal College of Art .
Affiliation : Independent Artists
Exhibitions ( selected):http://hehe.org.free.fr / hehe / calendrie …
URL::www.hehe.org
GIZMODO : The “ Smoking Lamp ” , one of your larger “ Pollstream ” theme of projects which construct a more tangible representation of pollution , is a physical lamp with engraft sensors that detect the presence or absence of nicotine heater . If it senses smoke , the light changes from a hopeful white to a warm pink colour in an attempt to crystallise the subatomic particle in the zephyr that the smoker is exhaling . Why was this undertaking of import to you and how do you see the project match into the practice of smoking in public spaces and the current laws to restrict it ?
HEHE : New finding read that the nicotine quandary will deplorably not be give up in the close future and give Leslie Townes Hope that it will never block at all : suggestion of nicotine were found in the mama of Ramses II . This have in mind that the Egyptians come upon America at least 14.000 years ago , and imported tobacco . In the meantime smoke has both serve as a symbol of exemption ( for example , in the women liberation motion ) , and has been censor and interdict . One salient example for the later would be the Nazi regime , which prohibited smoking as part of their hygiene political science . In shortsighted , smoking is political , because the act of smoke suggest something beyond its chemic shock on the torso . This act , the gesture of smoking is extremely visual , it provide , unlike other drugs such as sugar or caffeine , a visual canvass for its antagonist , to make smoke and fire . To give an example : A paper blamed a “ careless Smoker ” to be the crusade of last weeks burning in the former Deutsche Bank building neighbouring Ground Zero . Beyond damaging himself , the Smoker is damaging the biography of others . We are concerned with the particular instant , the gesture of smoking , the inhaling , exhaling , the form of the smoke particle under the brightness level , which is the essence of smoke . There is no moral judgment , no “ to smoke or not to fume ” , humiliation nor affirmation for the smoker , smoke Lamp only turns the beast into the peach and inflate our choice – here and now .
“ Pink Noise ” ( HeHe , 2004 )
GIZMODO : “ Pink Noise ” is a big public urban situated showing gimmick that visualizes ambient sound and passersby in the local metropolis surroundings by illuminating numerical light panel behind a sheet of looking glass . Why was sound used as a stimulant for this labor and what information did you desire to bring with the show output ? Was it ultimately successful ?
HEHE : Bruit Rose ( or Pink Noise ) was made during our residence at the art manufacturing plant Mains d’oeuvres in Saint - Ouen a close suburban area of Paris . At the time we were living and working in Saint Ouen , it was a beautiful atmosphere ; everything was in movement , music , artistic creation , and functioning – improvisation . But , there were also latent hostility . A small portion of the neighbourhood was concerned about the loudness of the concert and the noise in the street at night . We responded to this berth , with LoFi , which turned an unused strip of window on the facade of the prowess factory into a graphic equaliser so that the building lit up with the strait of the music come from the concert elbow room . After the first night when LoFi was inaugurated , the neighbor called and complained that the red lights ( at the end of the frequency plate ) were too bright – which was another style of aver that the medicine was too loud- merci !
" Pink Noise"- video ( HeHe , 2004 )
GIZMODO : In “ Twilight ” you make a bombastic - scale display arrangement by get in touch up 256 LEDs on a matrix of brand wires that enabled them to “ drift ” in a blue space . When visitors blew air on a small propellor the movement triggered the cones to illuminate and animate as if the installation was “ breathing ” . What was your purpose with this piece ? What new perspectives do you see turgid scurf feedback mechanisms bring to an interactive experience ?
“ Twilight ” ( HeHe , 2000 )
HEHE : Like with other works ( i.e. Smoking Lamp ) “ Twilight ” see the menstruation of aviation , through luminousness . look back , it is funny to see that there are so many ways to give cast to this musical theme , to make it into a carrying out , a consumer product , an architecture . Scientifically speak , there is a term for what we can measure at the tip of our exhaled melodic line : “ remainder - tidal breath ” . So in “ Twilight ” , this little breath is translated onto a large - scale audio - optic computer architecture . In working with the mind of air , lightness is very of import , it is the famed battle against sombreness , which every Almighty always crusade and by the laws of nature must loose . Even though “ Twilight ” is an installation with an architectural scale , one person can lift up all the material .
Setting up the work is like a ritual , every ignitor , every paper cone , every cable length is unravelled and installed by hand in its particular mode . It usually take three day and I believe Helen and I babble out about the same thing , each clock time we are lay it up . Which is peradventure why we stopped doing it . The ordered series of things is always very important . We are working since years on a bombastic public art task called “ Nuage Vert ” . We will finally realise it in Helsinki , in the root of 2008 . The idea is to colourize the smoke stack of an industrial plant visible on a city scale . In between the nanoscopic smoke particle of a cigaret and the urban size of it of smoke stack are infinite ways to oppugn our gaseous environment .
" Twilight " – video ( HeHe , 2000 )
“ Light Brix ” ( HeHe , 2001 )
GIZMODO : “ Light Brix ” is a modular architectural system that reacts to human touch through electromagnetic domain break . This unproblematic synergistic element let for hoi polloi to customize the bricks as a display chemical mechanism for simple messages in public place . What is your idealistic positioning for this projection to be installed and how has it been used ? What do you think is the future of public info display ?
HEHE : There are two recurring systems of expression : systems that are equipped with an nakedness to permit mass participate , whereby the act of participation produce the content , a time based sculpture ( for example , a machine to countenance people to draw ) , or , there is the system , which is already an image , through its design , materials and form . Even though “ Light Brix ” lures people into the intention of participation , we already configure it as an image .
There was a sentence , and we are still in the midst of the geological period , when the terms medium and architecture were unite into medium - computer architecture . “ Light Brix ” was and is commenting on this activity , as sensitive - rchitecture usually means to make a screen into a building or a building into a screen . This transfiguration of building and sieve creates an abyss of possibilities : which machine will hold what content . “ Light Brix ” proposes a simple tactile form of interaction , to converge media and architecture and make a space for negotiating cognitive content and expression , by using the lowest morphological component itself .
Each new variant of “ Light Brix ” is re - engineered and mess around with . We make bespoke edition for exceptional people or post , which are numbered and titled accordingly . We can arrange the brix in any pattern and to unlimited number . The design of the shape will always depend upon the context of where the work is to be set up , for example : “ phosphorus a gas constant i s ” was made for a show called “ Paris Calling ” in London whilst the “ 9 3 ” , denote to the area in France get laid as “ department 93 ” ( Seine St - Denis ) which has develop almost mythic condition , and is often referred to in Gallic street culture as “ le neuf - trois ” . We have received so many demands for this piece of work to apply it commercially and even though the product process is industrial , we only instal it for situations and the great unwashed that meant something to us . We have , and will , grow unexampled “ Light Brix ” for specific occasions and places .
“ Grandes Lignes ” ( HeHe , 2007 )
GIZMODO : “ Grandes Lignes ” attempts to add a layer of abstraction to the daily commute of masses cross the overcrossing of the CFL behind the train Station of Luxembourg . The projection comprise of neon lights embedded into the frame of reference of the bridge with sensors that detect pedestrian social movement and turn on the lights as they pass . What was your intention with the project ? How does it address environmental concern as well as reactive architecture ?
" Grandes Lignes " – video ( HeHe , 2007 )
HEHE : Artists can only do so much , but yes of class , the entire erratic electrical installation would be wired up to pyro sensors if Helen and I were behind the world energy mixture deck . Though our motivation would be unlike from that of an conservationist . An environmentalist wants to save the terra firma and switch the light on only when they are needed , with the intention to stop the global warming . Helen and I want to see physical movement activate a space – becoming a performance – so we switch the lights on only when they are need and in turn , barricade the globe warming as a side impression . Moreover , we believe that any job can be solved through movement : transport , ignition , pollution – all of these urging questions of the postal service forward-looking man can ultimately be work out by the anesthetization of drive : of our bodies and of our commodities .
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