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The skeleton of a small falcon is arranged around moving electronic parts and drummed with its own feathers. The falcon is part of Zwanikken’s exhibit “Microskeletals.”

Blooms sense, beckon viewers

culture@dailylobo.com

Los Angeles-based architect Filipa Valente built bright orange plastic shells to go along with the “machine wilderness” theme at this year’s International Symposium on Electronic Art.

The piece, titled “Liminoid Bloom*s,” is supposed to look like a hybrid of a plant and a machine.

“It’s an artificial ecology that mediates between the gallery space and the environment of the city,” she said.

As viewers walk near the plant machine, the lights become brighter; it can sense sound vibrations. The contraption also pulsates up and down as viewers near.

“I wanted them to be a little bit like gardens; I wanted them to feel very much between artificial, but also linking up to the natural world,” Valente said. “I wanted them to feel like organisms — that they felt like life. I was really inspired by the way plants react to the environment. If they are polluted, they will die out.”

The piece also has sensors placed outside 516 ARTS that detect noise from the street. The plant will pulse and light up when more people walk down the street.

“I want them (viewers) to be surprised by it, to wonder,” she said. “I don’t want it to be too obvious what they’re doing, but I want them to challenge them a little bit — how the user approaches them and really wonder what they’re doing. It’s not a straightforward read. Also, to be a little bit hypnotized by them and how to play with them a little bit.”

Valente said she originally wanted to put the plants in the densest, most urban areas in Los Angeles. But then it took longer than she expected to assemble the piece, so she said she’s keeping her options open.

“As an architect, this is my interest: to work on these interactive projects, especially starting artificial ecologies,” she said.

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