ZOO February 2, 2007

ZOO

Ingrid Bachmann, Garnet Hertz, Amy Youngs

February 2 to March 17, 2007
Opening Reception Friday February 2, 8:00 pm
Artist talks Friday February 2, 7:00 pm

All events at InterAccess 9 Ossington Avenue

InterAccess is pleased to present ZOO, an exhibition of three works by three artists that artfully integrate natural and artificial life, colliding the realm of living things with the genre of creative electronics. Artists Ingrid Bachmann, Garnet Hertz and Amy Youngs explore the complex relationship between technology, culture and nature. This exhibition includes a cockroach-controlled robot, a holodeck for house crickets and hermit crabs that surf the net!

Please join us for a special opening reception on Friday February 2, 8:00 pm at InterAccess Electronic Media Arts Centre, 9 Ossington Avenue. Artist talks will take place prior to the reception at 7:00 pm. Live demonstrations of "Cockroach Controlled Mobile Robot #3" will take place at the opening reception, as well as on Saturday, February 3 from 12:00 to 5:00 pm.

More information about the works in the exhibition:
"Digital Crustaceans v.0.3: Homesteading on the World Wide Web" involves live hermit crabs and their avatars that explore the World Wide Web. The hermit crabs have two homes - a large glass terrarium and a 'home' page on the Web. The movements of the real crabs within the terrarium are tracked by a motion capture system and animate a mechanical plotter that traces its movements onto a surface. These mappings serve as formal drawings as well as a record to track the movements of the avatars, as they map their itinerary and journey across the structures and sites of the World Wide Web. More information about this project can be found at http://www.digitalhermit.ca/

"Cockroach Controlled Mobile Robot #3" is an experimental mechanism that uses a living Madagascan hissing cockroach atop a modified trackball to control a three-wheeled robot. If the cockroach moves left, the robot moves left. Infrared sensors also provide navigation feedback to the cockroach, striving to create a pseudo-intelligent system with the cockroach as the CPU. More information about this project can be found at http://www.conceptlab.com/roachbot/

"Holodeck for House Crickets" is a suspended artificial landscape that is designed to house Acheta domesticus (house crickets), who are raised in climate-controlled tanks as food for reptiles. As actual nature would be a bit harsh for these domesticated crickets, artist Amy Youngs provided them with an artificial landscape where they can interact with a video "holograph" of the pastoral grasslands and woodlands experienced by their wild relatives. Through the use of a computer interface, the crickets are able to "interact" with their projected environment by chirping. Each chirp advances the panoramic, cricket-eye-view video footage of outdoor scenery. More information about this project can be found at http://www.ylem.org/artists/ayoungs/holodeck.html

Official Website: http://www.interaccess.org