Installation view. © Luiz Zanotello, 2016

The Aerographer (2016 -)

mixed-media installation (hot-wire anemometers, linear motion systems, metric bands, electronics, plastic flag)

The Aerographer maps the air to create a subtle territory of uncertainty. The kinetic installation measures the airflow at different locations and translates the differences into the mechanical movement of an array of nodes. The nodes move on different axes, shifting connected lines, unfolding a networked topography of the air in constant adaptation and change. The installation explores the chaotic behavior of air to unfold an unstable tangible map of a fictional territory, and deals spatially with the uncertainty that arises from a space of constantly shifting boundaries that react with the air.

The work explores the spatial anxieties of perceiving difference and establishing relative boundaries in times of ubiquitous technological mediation and accentuated societal uncertainties. It addresses the question: what is it like to live in air-like times, when everything is transparent and no ground remains? By interweaving a narrative of a system that seeks to maintain a place within the clouds, the project speculates on how contemporary digital utopias of network and information might shift towards the turbulent tensions between materiality and boundaries, orientation and limits, place-making and transparency.

Documentation. © Luiz Zanotello, 2016

Documentation of a few of its exhibitions. © Luiz Zanotello, 2016 - 2017

Installation view at "Prima Materia", Tolhuistuin, Fiber Festival 2017, Amsterdam. © Fiber Festival, 2017

Acknowledgements: developed as part of the MA program in Digital Media at the HfK Bremen, supervised by Prof. Dr. Andrea Sick, Prof. Dennis P. Paul, and Prof. Peter v. Maydell.