When asking the question “Do humans dream of machines?”, it’s natural to think of the feverish excitement ahead of an iPhone or Playstation launch, followed by lines around the block of enthusiastic campers, eager to get their hands on the latest hardware as soon as is humanly possible. However, it’s also the title of an art piece by [Jonghong Park], and is deserving of further contemplation. (Video after the break.)
The art piece consists of a series of eight tiny harmonicas, which are in turn, played by eight fans, which appear to have been cribbed from a low-power graphics card design. Each harmonica in turn has a microphone fitted, which, when it picks up a loud enough signal, causes an Arduino Nano to actuate a mechanical finger which slows the fan down until the noise stops. It’s the mechanical equivalent of a stern look from a parent to a noisy child. Then, the cycle begins again.
The build is very much of the type we see in the art world – put together as simply as possible, with eight Arduinos running the eight harmonicas, whereas an engineering approach may focus more on efficiency and cost. Between the squeaks from the toy harmonicas and the noise from the servos entrusted to quiet them, the machine makes quite the mechanical racket. [Jonghong] indicates that the piece speaks to the interaction of machine (robot harmonica) and humanity (the finger which quells the noise).
It’s a tidily executed build which would be at home in any modern art gallery. It recalls memories of another such installation, which combines fans and lasers into a musical machine.
you know it’s art when it’s posted on vimeo.
The playback wasn’t bad this time. Usually Vimeo manages to stall on playback even though the buffer is far ahead. At least it’s not JW Player.
Never have problems with vimeo on linux (firefox/chrome), windows (chrome) or mac (safari).
Bagpipe is still the winner.
Finally, an artwork that exemplifies the relationship being technology and annoying little brothers.
I’d call that a win for the designer/artist. They got you responding both thoughtfully and emotionally because of their creation. That’s what art is for right? Thinking about technology and little brothers and having a feeling about that. :-)
I can’t say the work caused me to respond all that well. I kept looking for a direct purpose and failing. I simply gave up without thinking i’d learned or felt anything. Then I read your post and I was able to deem it valuable. :-)
I just tried to figure out what was making the grunt/sigh sound the whole time.
Me
No
These fans look like blowers for cheap 3d printer hotends.
Poor fan bearings,
The eight Arduinos are actually for 8x the blog cred…