Acclair Shopping Cap (2008)

Photographs depict fashionable brainscanning headset for shopping and neuromarketing. User dons headset during shopping spree, logging Neurocapital points as she looks at Acclair partner products. Participating vendors offer free garments and accessories in exchange for banked Neurocapital points.

Hummer (actions with the H2) January 26-27, 2008

Rented a Hummer H2. Invaded 100 Performances for the Hole at the Garage Biennale, managed to enter tight Pacific Heights garage, departed truck with door alarm ringing, amplified sound of door alarm, video monitor of underside of truck, grafittied word "SAFE" on bottom of truck while in mechanic's "hole".

Next day blocked traffic at an Oakland intersection, jumped out of truck, door alarm ringing, walked around truck, got back in and drove to return truck.

LA Interchange (currently in development)

A gigantic public water fountain at the intersection of the Santa Monica and Harbor freeways in Los Angeles activated by the highway accidents monitored by the California Highway Patrol Incident Report website. The artwork takes the form of a public parkland proposal consisting of site research, diagrams, plans and renderings, functioning software prototype, and a working scale model of the fountain and parkland (pictured). The software system uses real-time automobile accident information culled from the California Highway Patrol Incident Report website and would activate the enormous water fountain at the intersection of the freeways. more

Live Computer Model
Scrapes the California Highway Patrol Incident Report Page

Acclair (2004-2006)

Acclair is a security and neuromarketing service that points to a new form of discrimination: Acclairism, a discrimination based on the individual’s bio-data and membership in an “acclaired” elite. Through Acclair, a company providing brain-testing services as part of an exclusive security clearance for air-travelers, we explore a situation wherein people freely accept a highly invasive, highly authoritative manipulation in return for financial, tangible rewards and an upgraded social status. We illustrate the financial and social benefits of such a system through its Neurocapital and Amnesty programs that offer alternatives to racial profiling.

Motivations, documentation, exhibitions & conferences

ISEA 2006 ZeroOne installation video documentation

One to Another (2005)
(video 4'36")

Inspired by the ambivalence felt toward having a baby, and dozens of friends having them, "one to another" visits the interior feelings associated with pregnancy viewed from an exterior male perspective. Mirrored images distort two pregnant women as they wait, together yet separate. Pensively waiting to give birth, they become other beings, become magical and grotesque at the same time.

Blank (2005-2006)
(charcoal drawings approximately 4'x6' each)

A series of ongoing drawings of found photos, friends and myself in the characteristic "blank" face -- a face that directs the presence of the person outside himself, exterior to self. It is as if the person has left their physical body behind.

Autogrill Monument (2003-2004)

AutoGrill Monument is a sublime ambient display of real-time highway fatalities integrated into the popular Italian roadside restaurant AutoGrill in Novara, Italy. Each time a highway fatality occurs on the Italian Autostrada, an integrated alert system activates a jet of blue liquid that shoots 20 meters high to fill the water-filled column that pierces the roadside restaurant. Viewing of the Memorial Cloud is available both inside AutoGrill and from a distance of 2 KM.

This project is currently undergoing legal attack from the Benneton Corporation, co-owner of the Autogrill Restaurant chain and stakeholder in the Italian Autostrada itself.

Superthumb (2004)

A polyurathane thumb as biometric masquerade. Embedded RFID tag simulates the use of a replica thumb to enter fingerprint security gateways. This project was a preliminary exploration of biometrics issues that evenually led to Acclair. Theoretically, the thumb is a prop that stands in for the user's actual biometric. It also stands out as what Slavoj Zizek calls the stain -- the real as horror. As the phallic castrated part, it symbolizes the submission and loss of power that biometric authentication involves. Yet it is also the phallic signifier of power, like the King and his staff and crown, the signifying elements of power make the king a king. This thumb makes the user part of the elite Superthumb Group, the power elite that through desire of convenience have given up part of themselves to gain entrance into the symbolic power structure.

Symbolic House (2003)

An interactive and reactive inflatable installation that incorporates touch, motion and heat sensors, and audio POTs connected to household items to trigger video and audio through MAX/MSP/Jitter. Intention was to create an interactive house, but instead we created a house devoid of human connection, a narcissistic mirror zone not unlike Solaris.

Created in partnership with Daniele Mancini at Interaction Design Institute Ivrea.

HITCH (2003)

HITCH is an "in-car" service for commuters stuck in traffic in Los Angeles, CA, USA. I based this service in Los Angeles (my home town) and portrayed it as a service that I found by chance while doing research. As part of the experience prototype when I present the project, I refer to this "real" service.

The Gotta Father (2003)
(3'55")

Video scenario of a "SoundGem," a place-specific, limited-capacity recordable sound object. Done in partnership with Michal Rinott and Hernando Barragan at the Interaction Design Institute Ivrea, the work looks at the possibility to store a small amount of audio in a wearable object, therefore turning the sound into precious chunks of memory. The video scenario

Living in Italy, we played off the Godfather stereotype as a conceptual ploy to indicate the special family significance such an object could embody and convey. In Italian with English subtitles.

Points of View (2003)

This video scenario uses Blair Witch Project as an inspiration to depict a misuse of technology, in this case a service where customers can hire roving reporters with video devices and remotely communicate with them through a form of telepresence. The concept includes a video annotation web service that connects base station users with remote individuals carrying wireless devices.

This type of service could be used in situations where the customer cannot or is unwilling to venture into dangerous or inappropriate places. In this case, a devious customer gets his thrills at the expense of the reporters for hire.

Work done in partnership with Tarun Rawat for Italian Telecom at the Interaction Design Institute Ivrea.

Follow the Leader (2002)
(proposed bronze bench)

Proposal for a large bronze seating feature to be placed as "plop art" in a corporate or federal building courtyard.

Soft Sculpture (1994-2001)
(Flash portfolio - let it load)

Objects & installations for the most part using soft materials such as foam rubber, stuffed fabric, rubber, silicone, carpet and carpet padding. Cute "Stuffy" is a life-size stuffed fabric doll with an arm-fisting orifice in the tummy. "Waiting" is an altered chair with testicles (homage to Luis Bunuel). "Cannon," pictured to the left, is a flacid indication of failed power. "Enormous Burden" is a giant slingshot installation that shoots 3' long stuffed fabric sperm at a 6' x 6' pink vinyl uterus on the wall. "Cabin Fever" posits a series of works inspired by claustrophobia. Many more.

Labyrinth / Laboratory (1990-1993)

Crawlthrough sculpture 8'w x 12'L x 8'h broken up into three levels of medical/technological history--middle ages, 19th-mid 20th century and late 20th century biotech. Interactive machines were made from castoff computer printers and other mechanical elements. Audio of Luc Montagnier, the discover of the AIDS virus, gives a lecture on HIV circa 1992.